{"conf": "internet", "generated_at": "2026-04-26T08:00:02.954878Z", "threads": [{"num": 1, "subject": "allow me to introduce myself", "response_count": 55, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "belapur", "date": "Fri, Oct 18, 1996 (07:38)", "body": "I am paddy. I perticularly interested in internet. These days I am engaged in browsing through the internet. In one of the sessions I came across spring and this conference. I find this really fascinating and I truely look towards it positively to get closer to the rest of the world."}, {"response": 2, "author": "terry", "date": "Fri, Oct 18, 1996 (14:41)", "body": "Glad you came by. What kinds of topics interest you?"}, {"response": 3, "author": "rover", "date": "Wed, Oct 30, 1996 (15:30)", "body": "Interested in server solutions for setting up an isp. What do people think is the best Operating System and Server Software? What do people think of Windows NT and Windows IIS? That is my primary interest."}, {"response": 4, "author": "rover", "date": "Wed, Oct 30, 1996 (15:32)", "body": "Interested in server solutions for setting up an isp. What do people think is the best Operating System and Server Software? What do people think of Windows NT and Windows IIS? That is my primary interest."}, {"response": 5, "author": "rover", "date": "Wed, Oct 30, 1996 (15:33)", "body": "Interested in server solutions for setting up an isp. What do people think is the best Operating System and Server Software? What do people think of Windows NT and Windows IIS? That is my primary interest."}, {"response": 6, "author": "terry", "date": "Thu, Oct 31, 1996 (00:49)", "body": "I'd say it's a toss up between Website and IIS. But I'm only going to post it once. Microsoft also has a server built into FrontPage. Check out the FrontPage topic in the Apps conference. For industrial strength, Apache running under BSDI is the way to fly. That's our horse for this site. Can you tell us some more specifics about your requirements and what types of websites you're putting up? Is it a single site or multiple sites running under one server."}, {"response": 7, "author": "warf", "date": "Tue, Nov 12, 1996 (22:25)", "body": "Hello. My name is doug and I am having trouble getting pegasus mail to work. It does not give me the option of network configuration and check host for new mail, even though my ppp connnection is fine (since I can use telnet and netscape). I have reinstalled it and still don't get the pop3 and network option in the setup. Can anyone help or has anyone experienced this problem. Thanks"}, {"response": 8, "author": "terry", "date": "Tue, Nov 12, 1996 (22:39)", "body": "Have you posted this in the Pegasus Mail topic?"}, {"response": 9, "author": "COMPACT", "date": "Fri, Nov 15, 1996 (09:26)", "body": "excuse me....i'm a NEW USER...CAN SOMEBODY explain to me...... please help...."}, {"response": 10, "author": "COMPACT", "date": "Fri, Nov 15, 1996 (09:31)", "body": ""}, {"response": 11, "author": "terry", "date": "Fri, Nov 15, 1996 (09:41)", "body": "Sure, what's your email address. We'll throw you a lifesaver."}, {"response": 12, "author": "amandad", "date": "Sun, Nov 17, 1996 (19:58)", "body": "Hello. My name is Mandy. I am a novice internet user. I am trying to set up Telnet so that I can access and search university library databases. I am running Win95 which has a telnet app. I am not sure how to get it to work -- saw your page while searching around for FAQ's. This is probably not the appropriate place to ask questions of this nature, so thanks."}, {"response": 13, "author": "terry", "date": "Sun, Nov 17, 1996 (20:13)", "body": "I'd recommend you get a copy of crt from Forrest's site or from the topic on crt here. This is a far better telnet program than the one that you get with Windows. And welcome aboard the Spring!"}, {"response": 14, "author": "trainmaster", "date": "Sat, Dec  7, 1996 (11:04)", "body": "I am new to the internet also. I am lost in all the mumbo-jumbo. I would like to get in on the chat lines, but am not sure how to go about it. I found thhis one by accident. Now I am even more confused. Do I need some more software or just a better understanding of how to operate? If anybody can help, or tell me in plain English how to go about getting into the chat lines and what I need. Thanks."}, {"response": 15, "author": "terry", "date": "Sat, Dec  7, 1996 (13:09)", "body": "You've got what you need. But we're not a \"real time\" chatline unless you would call this slow motion chat. We do \"conferencing\" which means you drop a comment and come back in a day or two to check responses."}, {"response": 16, "author": "arch1234", "date": "Wed, Dec 11, 1996 (02:01)", "body": "Hi Paul, I have already given U my introduction in WEB topic.Well here again I will give U my intro.I am Archana Sharma from INDIA.I am Computer engg and CNE(novell engg;).I am interested in Networking and finally I have gone into it.For this reason I am working on internet and still wants to learn more and more.I want to learn all about it.I am also going for microsoft certified engineer in Feb. Hope our spring conference will grow grow and grow so that all of us will learn much more things. See U soon.. ...Archana"}, {"response": 17, "author": "terry", "date": "Wed, Dec 11, 1996 (07:56)", "body": "I hope that as well!"}, {"response": 18, "author": "granpana", "date": "Sat, Jan 11, 1997 (11:36)", "body": "hello there"}, {"response": 19, "author": "krisg", "date": "Wed, Jan 29, 1997 (19:18)", "body": "I am very interested to learn. Just one year ago, I had no concepts of what a computer is, and now I can surf the web. I have read lots of books, and merely by doing things I have learnt. I would like to learn more. I do this mostly for fun and enjoy. I accidently learnt of Spring, and this is my first exposure and I already like what I see. I have choosen two hot topics, and will post more message and exchange views and ides. Thanks for the oppurtunity. Gopal. guttocut@sgi.net"}, {"response": 20, "author": "terry", "date": "Thu, Jan 30, 1997 (08:50)", "body": "We're glad you're joining up Gopal, tell us more about yourself and where you're from, if you don't mind."}, {"response": 21, "author": "krisg", "date": "Sun, Feb  2, 1997 (17:01)", "body": "I am from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. I am a physician, and I like to play with computers, so that my children do not intimidate me, and have come a long way from knowing nothing just a year ago and to be able to access. I wonder if you could help me. I have Internet Explorer and Netscape browser on my disc. I use only the netscape browser, which has been the default browser. However whenever I download something from netscape into my harddisk, the downloaded file attaches itself with microsoft explorer logo, and at times, when I open it the internet explorer launches. What can I do to stop this. Thank you for your help ."}, {"response": 22, "author": "koes", "date": "Mon, Feb  3, 1997 (04:01)", "body": "Hi Paul Thank's for your email. I work in MIS department of PT.Timah one of the big Tin Company in Bangka Island, Indonesia. Currently we have 8 Novell File Servers and already connected to the Internet via ISP (Least Line). We are using Cisco router to connect from Bangka Island to Jakarta Office. We have an HP9000 E-25 for gateway. Could you give me some information about \"Fire Wall\", can we use PC base for that ? Thank's"}, {"response": 23, "author": "mephisto", "date": "Sun, Mar  9, 1997 (16:02)", "body": "Like many, I too am a bit lost at the moment. I started out trying to find out if a program like trumpet existed for Win 95. I have recently upgraded from Win 3.1 top Win 95, and am not able run the dial up manager to access my service provider, ( actually its worse than the , the modem never even goes off hook, i.e. no dial tone, do dial). I finally found that if I enabled the \"record a log file\" option in 'System Properties. Modem.connection.advanced' (short hand), I was then able to get my modem to dial and get on the Net . Thoughts?"}, {"response": 24, "author": "terry", "date": "Mon, Mar 10, 1997 (21:43)", "body": "Trumpet Winsock is available for Windows 95. Another program you may want to look at is RAS+95. Take a look at the critical winsock section of Forrest's site at http://www.stroud.com and the reviews here in the apps conference of these programs. You've come to the right place!"}, {"response": 25, "author": "Limey", "date": "Sun, Mar 16, 1997 (11:49)", "body": "Hi gang, I am new to computers and the Internet and am having a ball (but not much sleep) since I got it. I found a program called ICQ at www.mirabilis.com that has let me chat and conference people all over the world. I came accross Spring by accident and look forward to many interesting conversations and exchanges of ideas and information, and also to making new friends. I work as a supervisor in the plastic extrusion industry, play banjo in a Dixie/New Orleans Jazz Band, hack my way around golf courses, uphold Masonic and Elk principles and hate to miss out on good times and fun (Hope I passed the Audition :] )"}, {"response": 26, "author": "terry", "date": "Sun, Mar 16, 1997 (21:52)", "body": "You passed with flying colors. Hope you join us in our topics on golf and music. I use ICQ to keep in touch with my work associates here at the Spring and my sister. It's very useful! The only drawback is that it's dependent on their server, but they seem to keep their server up pretty reliably."}, {"response": 27, "author": "phi1", "date": "Tue, Apr 15, 1997 (03:01)", "body": "Hello.I am new to the internet and also trying to hook up to my university computers. I had been told by a fellow student to try connecting using a telnet file however it caused a fault with my service provider. I am running netscape with a shiva dialler.Is there a problem with my software not being compatable with telnet and winsock application? I got onto this chatline because the provider listed you when I was looking up their information on telnet. Thanks for your help."}, {"response": 28, "author": "terry", "date": "Tue, Apr 15, 1997 (23:30)", "body": "Try another telnet application is the one you're using doesn't work. Download one of the telnet apps on Forrest's site: http://www.stroud.com or in our own apps conference."}, {"response": 29, "author": "tracy5", "date": "Sun, May 25, 1997 (15:56)", "body": "I'm a counselor and Internet trainer in New England, and would qualify as a Netaholic given all the time I spend online. Forums and mailing lists particularly occupy my attention, as does designing my site, which is a resource site for Windows 95 and the Internet, focusing on the top searching resources - Windweaver http://www.windweaver.com Recently, I've discovered that much of what I search for is not on the Web at all, but in databases or ftp sites not indexed by search engines, so I'm turning my attention to the old Internet. Recently, I wrote an in-depth step-by-step tip on how to Telnet and on Telnet resources online. See my Windows 95 tips of the Week at http://www.windweaver.com/w95tips.htm"}, {"response": 30, "author": "terry", "date": "Mon, May 26, 1997 (15:06)", "body": "Which other forums do you frequent?"}, {"response": 31, "author": "pandikar", "date": "Wed, Jan 21, 1998 (13:33)", "body": "I believe I havent really introce myself, sort like jumping the gun... my name is Azman ,just call me Man age 31, male, working as an assistant engineer to Independant Power Producer in Malaysia... Studied in U.K. marine engineering..... Still new to this internet and computer stuffs. Cheerio"}, {"response": 33, "author": "Asif", "date": "Tue, Mar 10, 1998 (14:43)", "body": "Hello, my name is Asif and I surf the net for varied reasons (none being non-family ;-) ). I was just looking for information on inet phones and found this site while in Forrest's website. I just read the eval. on net2phone and was surprised to find the calling rate by min. to U.K., which is .18c per min. I am paying .12c per min. via my long distance carrier. Anyone has any ideas a cheaper (read: almost free) calling overseas via inet? Tnx, Asif"}, {"response": 34, "author": "terry", "date": "Tue, Mar 10, 1998 (21:25)", "body": "Use NetMeeting. As far as phone to net, I'm researching this topic now. No answers yet though."}, {"response": 35, "author": "amcgee", "date": "Mon, Sep  7, 1998 (18:13)", "body": "Hi, I'm new here, and a bit lost. I'm trying to figure out how the software works here on the Spring, and it's not going so well. I'm used to the WELL, which seems to have a much more intuitive default setup. How do I get the screen to stop scrolling after 24 lines? How can setup PICO as my default editor? Paul invited me onto the Spring to participate in the discussions, but I can't do that until I figure out how this system works. Art"}, {"response": 36, "author": "ratthing", "date": "Mon, Sep  7, 1998 (18:57)", "body": "hi art, welcome to the spring! i had all of the same questions you did as well as i am also a telnet user, and the setup here seems to be, well, not working too well. you need to have a file in your home directory called .cfrc, as well as some entries in your .profile file. if you like i can email you my files so you can see what goes into them, otherwise hopefully someone More Knowledgeable will be along. for whatever strange reason, the menus on the telnet interface do not work. i will enter a choice, say \"66\", and the menu will just come back the same, or i will go to some other menu i did not ask for."}, {"response": 37, "author": "terry", "date": "Mon, Sep  7, 1998 (22:54)", "body": "One way to do the scrolling bit is to do read | more at the prompt. This will cause it to pause at every screen. You're right those menus are \"under construction\" and they have a ways to go. Since we're a volunteer organization, and underfunded, they'll get done when someone with UNIX and scripting knowledge with one more vital asset called *time* can fix them. But in the meantime, I am *very* glad you're joining us Art and I think you find bountiful help from the folks here who have already jumped through those hoops. And the first sign on is always the most daunting because there is so much to catch up on. The r | more command is calling \"piping\" and it's a standard UNIX thing. The vertical bar is called a pipe. I hope this helps and more help is available."}, {"response": 38, "author": "ratthing", "date": "Mon, Sep  7, 1998 (23:57)", "body": "terry, i did not know you needed someone to work on the menus. i'd love to do that!"}, {"response": 39, "author": "amcgee", "date": "Tue, Sep  8, 1998 (00:19)", "body": "Yeah, thanks. I understand UNIX just fine, I just wasn't aware of how my shell needed to be setup for the conferencing software to work. On most systems, the conferencing software has it's own independent settings. Thanks again."}, {"response": 40, "author": "terry", "date": "Tue, Sep  8, 1998 (09:20)", "body": "Thanks Art, it's an issue that our conferening software should address. But our web population is much, much bigger than our telnet group, so naturally, the web is where most of our development has been."}, {"response": 41, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Mon, Apr 19, 1999 (16:03)", "body": "I would like to invite all visitors of this conference to the International Conflicts conference here on the Spring: http://www.spring.net/yapp-bin/restricted/browse/InternationalConflicts/all This new conference is dedicated to the disputes between groups all over the world, be that social, cultural, political or ethnical differences."}, {"response": 42, "author": "sociolingo", "date": "Sat, Oct 16, 1999 (10:58)", "body": "Hi I'm Maggie. I came here via the phinished conference which moved ina short while ago, and I'm getting to know various conferences. I'm an avid surfer, well as much as the telephone charging system in the UK will allow me to (we pay per second!). I usually surf for academic material and keep trying various surf engines to see which I find most productive. Nice to meet you all."}, {"response": 43, "author": "terry", "date": "Sun, Oct 17, 1999 (03:13)", "body": "Nice to meet you! Which are your favorite surf engines?"}, {"response": 44, "author": "sociolingo", "date": "Thu, Oct 28, 1999 (14:52)", "body": "I use dogpile.com a lot. It's a multiengine one and usually turns up some good stuff for my research."}, {"response": 45, "author": "terry", "date": "Thu, Oct 28, 1999 (14:58)", "body": "I've heard good stuff about it, remind me about your research, or elaborate on it, please?"}, {"response": 46, "author": "sociolingo", "date": "Thu, Oct 28, 1999 (15:21)", "body": "I'm looking at the use of local languages (as opposed to immersing the kids straight away in French or English) in the school system in sub-Saharan Africa ( for a PhD in education). At the moment I'm writing the thesis chapters on multilingualism in the world, and linguistic diversity in Africa. By surfing I've even been able to download government language policy documents - materials I could not have started to try and get the long way round."}, {"response": 47, "author": "terry", "date": "Fri, Oct 29, 1999 (14:16)", "body": "How do you feel about the policies you've downloaded, so far?"}, {"response": 48, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Sat, Oct 30, 1999 (15:01)", "body": "Hmh, I heard that children raised multilingually do not rank as high in IQ tests as monolingual kids. While that also says a lot about IQ tests... perhaps it makes sense to teach certain basics in motherlanguage first. E.g. in Southern Tyrolia after WWI, when it was taken over by Italy, German was banned in school. This resulted in a whole generation being less prficient in basic maths, reading and writing. Most were illiterates. There was an underground-school movement, and the teachers that got caught - young men and women, and many priests - were banished from their homes to South Italy."}, {"response": 49, "author": "sociolingo", "date": "Tue, Nov  2, 1999 (15:38)", "body": "1. policies i've downloaded. this is official govt material I would have had gteat difficulty finding through other channels. I didn't know South Africa, for example, had an offical language policy. Now I have the policy document. At the moment I'm just documenting these, not critiquing, that will come later. 2. Interesting points Alexander, especially the post WW1 bit. I think the tests you mention have mainly been in the States, and are used at the moment to substantiate the shift away from providing mother tongue education for hispanic students. (i.e. make them monolingual by disallowing the mother tongue). I may be wrong on that as I'm seeing it from this side of the pond! it has been said that some developmental skills take longer in bilingual children, but they seem to catch up pretty quickly. However, what I've observed so far in the classes I'm following is that the kids in the mother tongue classes are shooting ahead of the the children in the French only classes. By year three the difference is remarkable. The kids will move into the regular French system at year 7. I find the internet a valuable resource form finding material. Most of the sites I'm using are well-attested and the material is sound. Dredging by surfing provides other links, but they have then to be judged carefully as to where the material is coming from, the ethos, political bias etc. Phone charges are really inhibiting here. I have a free ISP which does OK, but at times I'm not using the net as much as I could because of the \ufffd\ufffd\ufffds."}, {"response": 50, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Tue, Nov  2, 1999 (15:48)", "body": "On the underground schools in S\ufffddtirol something must be available; I read a book on that (in German) in the mid-80ies, the publisher could have been in Bozen or Meran."}, {"response": 51, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Tue, Nov  2, 1999 (15:50)", "body": "That's in Italy, of course, and the book was brand new then."}, {"response": 52, "author": "sociolingo", "date": "Sun, May 20, 2001 (06:14)", "body": "Haven't looked in here for a while. Terry .. couldn't find 'browsers' here (apart from IE)...I'm amazed I thought my ISP was playing up and awful slow ... but I recently downloaded the new 'free' version of Opera (5.1) with java ...and it fair whizzes along... and uses multiple windows. I am really impressed. Doesn't seem to crash so often either and uses up a lot less memory (whichis as well on this old machine). Hotmail doesn't like it ...well, microsoft really, cos hotmail works fine .. just that they keep sending a message saying it wont work. Some sites don't like it either ...had trouble with the travelodge site which uses frames and says my browser doesn't support it .. its the only one I've really had probs with ...Didn't like the email that came with it. Oh yes, and my yahoo companion bar doesn't work with it either. It doesn't have a 'links' feature, but I found that by making a most used folder and keeping that open in the 'hotlist' box that works almost as well. the contacts feature is a bit limited in comparison with Yahoos addr ss list but bearable. In all a big improvement ... the speed makes up for a lot and the multiple windows are great."}, {"response": 53, "author": "jeffshong", "date": "Wed, Oct  3, 2001 (22:55)", "body": "Helo,I don't know what i'm doing now. However i love internet"}, {"response": 54, "author": "terry", "date": "Thu, Oct  4, 2001 (00:25)", "body": "What do you like about the net, Jeff?"}, {"response": 55, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Thu, Oct  4, 2001 (02:17)", "body": "Jeff, you have come to the right place. This site has interests for just about everyone. Aloha!"}, {"response": 56, "author": "cfadm", "date": "Wed, Jun 28, 2006 (15:06)", "body": "Indeed. internet conference Main Menu"}]}, {"num": 10, "subject": "ISPs - who is the best Internet Service Provider?", "response_count": 31, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "varepos", "date": "Mon, Sep 23, 1996 (18:40)", "body": "HI all, well I have only had one isp, which is wizard.com and they seem to be doing ok for me. What do they charge, well for unlimited www access and a personal homepage they charge $19.95 per month. For me with a business wep site, they charge me $25.00 160 hours access and $50.00 for page maint. which I do myself. I have looked at some other ips companies but they seem to charge more and they want to design my web pages and their connections don't seem to be as good as what I have. Thanks :}"}, {"response": 2, "author": "ITO", "date": "Wed, Sep  9, 1998 (02:03)", "body": "I use shaw wave through the cable company in Calgary and I love it!, too fast, no phone line tied up and 24-hour connection. I pay $40Canadian a month; it ain't so bad but for those that need it it's worth it, there is no web space for a site but there is for ftp. Also, you are allowed to have up to 5 email accounts, which I guess some people would benefit from. The program I am into is the Home network. We'll be moving to Austin pretty soon, does anyone know whether there is cable internet service through the local cable company?, who is the cable company down there? if the service exists does anyone know what it costs? Thanks and happy surfing! Ito"}, {"response": 3, "author": "terry", "date": "Wed, Sep  9, 1998 (04:23)", "body": "Welcome Ito, yes, we either have it or we're getting it very soon. Very glad you're joining us."}, {"response": 4, "author": "ratthing", "date": "Thu, Dec 10, 1998 (05:57)", "body": "WOOHOO! san antonio is finally getting CABLE MODEMS! i have already signed up for the beta test. http://www.paragon-sa.com/"}, {"response": 5, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Oct 29, 1999 (22:56)", "body": "Hawaii-on-line is great but has been bought by GST and when they are having difficulties I get dumped into The Well which has been purchased/merged or whatever with the even bigger mindspring conglomeration of which GST is a part. They keep upgrading regularly and they answer questions from their subscribers within 24 hours. Cable ISP is not yet available on this island, but when it is, HOL will be the provider, I am willing to bet on that! http://www.aloha.net"}, {"response": 6, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Oct 29, 1999 (23:13)", "body": "Including tax, I pay $20.78 per month unlimited with all sorts of services available"}, {"response": 7, "author": "terry", "date": "Sat, Oct 30, 1999 (00:50)", "body": "Mel Riser just split with ddc.net, the Spring's presence provider and Mel's been the big reason we've been with ddc. Mel's doing http://www.autoeloan.com and getting a T-1 at his house. So maybe Mel will become our provider. Not for sure but a possibility being bandied about."}, {"response": 8, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Sat, Oct 30, 1999 (01:47)", "body": "It would be lovely indeed to have access to a T1 line. My son has one at work - but he says it is still as slow (or as fast) downloading as the place you are accessing can feed it to you. If they have slow lines, your T1 line will not help you. I have noticed that when I was upgraded to 56K ability by my ISP."}, {"response": 9, "author": "sociolingo", "date": "Tue, Nov  2, 1999 (20:53)", "body": "I've moaned elswhere about the phone charging sytem in the UK. It's definitely prohibiting internet growth here. I am with Cable & Wireless as my ISP. It's free connection, unlimited online time, little content (i.e. no frills) which suits me fine. Connections have at times been slow, but better lately. In a recent computer mag survey they came top in the UK over the last six months. I tried Freeserve as my initial ISP (a year ago) and had all sorts of problems. A new company (to the UK) North Americ n Gateway is currently offering free connection, on-line time, and 24hr free phonecalls. It was in the Times newspaper yesterday. Already British Telecom is giving them problems in registering people. The campaign is mounting here for the govt to do something to free up access to the internet by sorting out the charging system and making BT play the game. BT have the technology but are going to ration ASDN lines and the word is that it's going to be too pricey for ordinary folk like me. Sorry, moan, moan, moan!"}, {"response": 10, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Tue, Nov  2, 1999 (20:57)", "body": "I use a ISDN line, and was with Nacamar until lately. I switched to Nikoma - no monthly fee, pay only only the phone fees of DM 0,479 - which is even lower than any city tariff!"}, {"response": 11, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Tue, Nov  2, 1999 (21:48)", "body": "I know it is expensive for European and Australian internet users. Alexander, I am happy you have found a better solution than before, but until you all have the same opportunities for unlimited free access, I will not be thrilled. We began that way, but it quickly became unlimited access when the AOL's of the world entered the market"}, {"response": 12, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Thu, Nov  4, 1999 (21:55)", "body": "I pay heavy, bthey - it's fast!!!!"}, {"response": 13, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Thu, Nov  4, 1999 (21:57)", "body": "that's \"but hey\" in the middle, BTW."}, {"response": 14, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Thu, Nov  4, 1999 (22:06)", "body": "Why is not the whole world internet enabled at a reasonable flat fee for unlimited use. That seems cruel and unusual to me, and deprives us of your company for longer periods than now available. How fast are you logged in? Right now I am being served on a line supplying 49.333 speed from my ISP but I have had 56K from them. That is the highest available locally (and which our phone company lines can handle.)"}, {"response": 15, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Thu, Nov 18, 1999 (23:08)", "body": "I could go for using two ISDN lines simultaneously... at double the rate..."}, {"response": 16, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Thu, Nov 18, 1999 (23:35)", "body": "What would that achieve? ....double the rate you pay for the privilege of using the ISDN, or double the rate od speed at which you are served?"}, {"response": 17, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Mon, Nov 22, 1999 (17:38)", "body": "ISDN gives you two lines you can use simultaneously at 64 whatevers each (and a bunch of phone numbers...), and with Multilink PPP, you can use both at the same time for downloads, webbing about, etc... at the price of paying for TWO lines! I don't think I want to get hooled on that..."}, {"response": 18, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Mon, Nov 22, 1999 (17:40)", "body": "So, to anwer your question - I'd get both!"}, {"response": 19, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Mon, Nov 22, 1999 (21:24)", "body": "Sounds ideal! I agree with you. (wondering if that option is available out here in the middle of an ocean...)"}, {"response": 20, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Fri, Dec 10, 1999 (10:17)", "body": "I heard ISDN is not as widely spread in the States as it is here..."}, {"response": 21, "author": "terry", "date": "Fri, Dec 10, 1999 (13:01)", "body": "It's fading out here in Austin with the advent of cable modems and DSL."}, {"response": 22, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Dec 10, 1999 (18:30)", "body": "I think that is happening here, as well. Most especially as regards the cable modems..."}, {"response": 23, "author": "terry", "date": "Wed, Dec 15, 1999 (02:43)", "body": "DSL is the next big thing. A lot of home networks will be built around them. Cable modems are pretty hot too, but they're somewhat hard to share on a network."}, {"response": 24, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Wed, Dec 15, 1999 (04:33)", "body": "I have learned the hard way not to share my home computer with anyone living here at present. There is not a firewall of sufficient strength to withstand the curiosity of a bored \"other\" so networking will not be an issue for me for a while, but I am sure it is for all of your computers in-house, Terry. Do you use separate dedicated lines or is there a master (other than yourself) involved?"}, {"response": 25, "author": "terry", "date": "Wed, Dec 15, 1999 (06:29)", "body": "I have two houses and isdn lines to both, and we run a common subnet. Most machines are either Win 98, NT or Win 2000."}, {"response": 26, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Wed, Dec 15, 1999 (19:34)", "body": "I gather you are satisfied with the speed and ease of getting online. What wouldbe your dream set-up? (And, no Crays listed for the Living room, please!)"}, {"response": 27, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Tue, Jan 11, 2000 (23:00)", "body": "Oh, but that one Cray looks so nicely like a sofa-style seating thingy for hotel lobbies, and the other looked like a small bar... Does that tell about their makers mindset?"}, {"response": 28, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Tue, Jan 11, 2000 (23:12)", "body": "...and they come in subtle and classy colors of charcoal and burgundy. Tres chic and a definite trend-setter. I guess, if you can't figure out how to use your bar-styled Cray, you can order up a tall cool one! Enough of those and you won't care whether you get it to work or not!"}, {"response": 29, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Tue, Jan 11, 2000 (23:32)", "body": "As they said, design IS everything... And wasn't the bar-type also fitted with some serious cooling device...?"}, {"response": 30, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Wed, Jan 12, 2000 (01:12)", "body": "Oh, is that what all of that coiled copper was in the back? I thought it might be a distill-it-yourself deal...perhaps both?! That in one clever machine!"}, {"response": 31, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Wed, Jan 12, 2000 (21:34)", "body": ";=} internet conference Main Menu"}]}, {"num": 11, "subject": "Encryption - PGP and otherwise", "response_count": 8, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "terry", "date": "Mon, Nov 11, 1996 (05:59)", "body": "Well, compared to the Clipper chip, maybe it is great. Check out the TranSoft Mail Control Center item in the apps conference for an email program that uses PGP. Now where did I put my keys?"}, {"response": 2, "author": "bubbi", "date": "Mon, Nov 11, 1996 (10:02)", "body": "Hi Terry! I think you left them inside your locked car. Sorry about that. I will provide you with the software to regain access.... PGP is considered unbreakable. The only known way to be able to read PGP encrypted PGP message is to break in to the receivers home/office to get his/her computer or at least copy of the private keys, and yet, although you have these you'll need his/her passphrase (Password) to be able to use the keys. Wiretapping is easy, it's the reading of whats going on on the wire that will be tricky...."}, {"response": 3, "author": "bubbi", "date": "Wed, Nov 13, 1996 (00:58)", "body": "Hi again Terry! I find this conference a bit hidden from the world! I'll place a link to this topic as well on my pages, as this relates to my work. The frontpage of your site should though be pointing more to this conversation; \"the Internet\". Everyone who surfs the net, likes talking about it!"}, {"response": 4, "author": "terry", "date": "Wed, Nov 13, 1996 (02:05)", "body": "And check out our web conference as well. Someday a travel conference or a places conference where we can talk about Sveeeden."}, {"response": 5, "author": "bubbi", "date": "Wed, Nov 13, 1996 (10:24)", "body": "Lets talk about: Who needs email encryption methods. The first topic i would like to mention here is: CLUBS AND CLUB-MEMBERS This group of users desperately need encrypted messages... Their subject concerns the club, prices, memberships etc, etc. The clubs i am in do not use email. All is sent by snail. Why? There are no easy mailers for us."}, {"response": 6, "author": "terry", "date": "Wed, Nov 13, 1996 (20:01)", "body": "By clubs, I mean to take it you are referring the to many \"associations\" that have memberships. That's what we have a lot of around Austin. But it would seem like their need for security wouldn't be as great as that of merchants seeking anonymity for credit card transactions. What kind of clubs are we talking abou here?"}, {"response": 7, "author": "bubbi", "date": "Wed, Nov 13, 1996 (23:25)", "body": "The whole bunch, really! Take: 1. Computer clubs. They have all sorts of price deals for members. 2. Roundtable. All sorts of deals and offers goes around between members. 3. Rotary, Lions, ... 4. All clubs dealing and weeling... I am refering to all clubs that have offers and dealing towards members. Many of them are also using creditcards to place orders when an offer comes along."}, {"response": 8, "author": "bubbi", "date": "Sun, Nov 17, 1996 (17:19)", "body": "The next PGP user group: THE COMPANIES. What makes PGP so special is not just the encryption, but also the fact that you can only decrypt the message IF IT COMES FROM THE RIGHT PERSON, but not just any person who makes believe as another person. This guarenties the receiver that the sender is actually the one that he sais he is. Thus you are able to send SIGNED CONTRACTS and other vital messages on whatever topic you choose as well as hidden/private messages. This makes the PGP STRONG and SECURE! internet conference Main Menu"}]}, {"num": 12, "subject": "Privacy on the net", "response_count": 11, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "tedchong", "date": "Tue, Dec 10, 1996 (05:24)", "body": "Use pgp if possible"}, {"response": 2, "author": "terry", "date": "Tue, Dec 10, 1996 (05:56)", "body": "Have you checked out TransSoft Mail Control Ted (see the topic in 'apps' conference)?"}, {"response": 3, "author": "tedchong", "date": "Wed, Dec 11, 1996 (13:43)", "body": "Thanks terry, will have a look at TransSoft Mail. What I used now is ccMail for Novell LAN and I can have pgp if I want."}, {"response": 4, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Tue, Jun 23, 1998 (12:45)", "body": "COMMERCE DEPARTMENT BEGINS PUBLIC MEETINGS ON INTERNET PRIVACY The Department of Commerce (DOC) will hold a two day public meeting on Internet Privacy today and Wednesday-- June 23 and 24. CDT will be participating in the event along with other consumer and privacy advocates. Your input is vital to this discussion. The agenda for the event can be found at the DOC privacy page: http://www.ntia.doc.gov/ntiahome/privacy/ The event will also be cybercast live. You can let your voice be heard by sending comments on the Department of Commerce's plans from CDT's comment page: http://www.cdt.org/privacy/survey Recent statements from the DOC indicate that the Administration does not view the July 1, 1998 deadline, set by their Framework for Electronic Commerce paper, as a cut-off for assessing the success of industry self-regulatory activities to protect privacy. Yet, while self-regulation should be a piece of privacy protections, the recent Federal Trade Commission report to Congress (see CDT Policy Post 4.14 for more information) demonstrates overwhelming evidence of the failure of private sector action alone to provide even basic safeguards. CDT believes that the conference this week should serve as the jumping-off point for the White House's effort to develop a coherent national policy on privacy. It is critical that the Administration work with Congress, privacy and consumer advocates, and members of the business community committed to providing privacy protections for their customers, to craft a framework for privacy protection. Towards this end CDT urges the Administration to work with Congress, the advocacy community, and all relevant stake holders to: * develop specific proposals to protect individual privacy through self-regulation, legislation and public education; * develop appropriate policy to protect children's privacy; * explore the role of technology in protecting privacy and methods by which the government can promote the development of privacy-enhancing technologies; and, * craft the outline of a privacy infrastructure including the creation of a federal entity to develop privacy policy in both the public and private sectors. It is time to develop the proposals and the strategy to move a national privacy policy forward."}, {"response": 5, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Sat, Jul 25, 1998 (05:02)", "body": "The Center for Democracy and Technology /____/ Volume 4, Number 16 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- A briefing on public policy issues affecting civil liberties online ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- CDT POLICY POST Volume 4, Number 16 July 22, 1998 CONTENTS: (1) Senate Attaches Internet Censorship Language to Appropriations Bill (2) Background Analysis (3) How to Subscribe/Unsubscribe (4) About CDT, Contacting us ** This document may be redistributed freely with this banner intact ** Excerpts may be re-posted with permission of |PLEASE SEE END OF THIS DOCUMENT FOR SUBSCRIPTION INFORMATION| _____________________________________________________________________________ (1) SENATE ATTACHES INTERNET CENSORSHIP LANGUAGE TO APPROPRIATIONS BILL Yesterday, the Senate moved one step closer to passing legislation which jeopardizes free speech and access to information on the Internet. Two measures, which were attached to a spending bill for the Commerce, State, and Justice departments after a voice vote, are based on two previously introduced bills: The Communications Decency Act (CDA) II (introduced by Senator Coats) and the Internet School Filtering Act (introduced by Senator McCain). Both are misguided efforts which will have a chilling effect on constitutionally-protected speech. Not only are they likely to be found unconstitutional, but they will certainly be ineffective at protecting children. Nevertheless, Congress is using these bills to posture, once again, on the issue of pornography on the Internet. CDT believes that a far better, more effective and more constitutional approach would be for Congress to lend its support to the effort to encourage parents to take responsibility for their children's Internet usage, and to encourage the development of tools which can help parents. Such a step has already been taken in a letter written by Senator Lieberman and Representative White . The Lieberman/White letter calls on Internet industry leaders to redouble their efforts to provide parents the tools and advice needed to guide their children's use of the Net. This letter was sent to the leaders of the Internet community who attended the Kids Online Summit in December which followed a July 1997 meeting with the White House. America saw what happened to the original CDA after being past by the last Congress -- the Supreme Court unanimously overturned it and told Congress in no uncertain terms that the Internet was entitled to \"the highest protection from governmental intrusion.\" But with this Congress nearing its end, legislators is poised to make the same mistake all over again. _____________________________________________________________________________ (2) BACKGROUND ANALYSIS CDT believes the language taken from McCain bill and the Coats bill are unconstitutional because they both attempt to impose a single national standard controlling what everyone online can see, think and say. The McCain bill (Internet School Filtering Act - S. 1619) would force schools and libraries with federally-subsidized Internet access to use software filters. Such a federal mandate likely violates the First Amendment because it places an unconstitutional condition upon receipt of federal funds. Although the Supreme Court has permitted some limited restrictions on federally funded speech (Rust v. Sullivan), the First Amendment forbids government from fashioning broad speech prohibitions by withholding federal funds. The Coats bill (CDA II - S.1482) appears to cover a more narrow range of speech than its predecessor, but still suffers from fundamental constitutional infirmities which will surely lead to yet another round of litigation. Moreover, both CDA I & II are ultimately ineffective at addressing a very real problem: the availability of inappropriate material online to children. In 1973 (in Miller v. California), the Supreme Court made 'contemporary community standards' the law of the land on the regulation of obscenity and material that is harmful to minors. Indeed, in Ginsberg v. New York, where the Court upheld restrictions on the sale of material harmful to minors, the Court explicitly noted that the definition of such material was based on \"prevailing standards in the adult community.\" But the McCain and Coats bills ignore--as the CDA ignored--the diversity of moral principles that hold sway in communities across the nation--and among the thousands of communities that exist on the Internet. Both bills also ignore the right of parents to teach their children responsibility and judgment as they see fit. It IS possible to find ways to protect children online without sacrificing the free speech values of the First Amendment. Nonprofit organizations and Internet industry members have been working for many months on solutions that will help keep children safe on the Internet. For information on a series of initiatives developed in the aftermath "}, {"response": 6, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Sat, Jul 25, 1998 (05:05)", "body": "****************************************************************** NUA INTERNET SURVEYS NUA INTERNET SURVEYS NUA INTERNET SURVEYS Weekly free email on what's new in surveys on the Internet By Nua Email: surveys@nua.ie Web: http://www.nua.ie/surveys/ ******************************************************************* July 20th 1998 Published By: Nua Limited Volume 3 No. 22 ******************************************************************** EDITORIAL ******************************************************************** Welcome to another weekly edition of Nua Internet Surveys. This newsletter provides information on surveys and reports on the Internet, and is brought to you by Nua - one of Europe's leading Internet consultancies and developers. The Internet School Filtering Act, sponsored by Senator John McCain, Arizona, recommends that public libraries and schools in the US install filtering software on all machines connected to the Internet. The bill is presented as being about protecting children from stumbling on potentially harmful material. While there is clearly a growing concern among parents for the protection of children online, the bill raises more questions than it answers. The most fundamental questions are: what is harmful material and who decides what is harmful? The proposed bill begs the question, who should monitor children's and in the case of public libraries, adults' Internet activity, the US government or the parents of those children? To what extent can you ask people to behave and have the same views as others? Is blanket legislation realistic? The children that are being protected are most likely to be the children who are naturally more adept at technological navigation and it's likely that they will innovate and find ways to get around filtering software. In addition curiosity is often roused by secrecy. In the case of pornography, while it is universally available on the Net, many sites - perhaps even a majority demand a credit card number upon entry. The majority of material deemed harmful by the majority of people has to be consciously sought out online. If someone, child or adult, is seeking this kind of material out on the Internet then it's not unreasonable to suggest that they will seek it out in physical shops. If they are going to public libraries to access the Internet we can assume that they probably cannot afford their own PCs/Web TV or Internet access or they do not want to use work accounts for private Internet use. Of course this is a generalisation and there are obviously other reasons why one might have to use public computers to go online but public libraries should be just that, public. Those who use public machines to go online are fighting an uphill battle in terms of having equal acess to the most important communications medium of the late C20th and the suggestion that they should be monitored or \"babysat\" in any way is offensive. There are many problems with this bill, least of all the fundamental assumption that people need to be guided or controlled in some way, be they parents or individuals. In a very quick straw poll of my colleagues in Nua, I asked the following questions, and 15 (about half the staff) took the time to answer. [Has anyone ever been \"really offended\" by material they came accross online, either through email or surfing?] - Four said yes [Would you advocate blanket legislation for filtering content in public libraries and schools or should it be left up to individuals and parents?] - 12 said it should be left to individuals, 3 were unsure. [Does anyone think that blanket legislation for children's use of the Net is the start of a slippery slope towards controlling people's use of the Internet?] - 15 said yes. We're not a particularly paranoid bunch here at Nua but the unanimous response to the last question provides much food for thought. The implementation of blanket legislation \"for the protection of children\" is in my mind paranoid on the behalf of those who advocate it. Parents have up until now made their own decisions on what their children should or should not be exposed to, from books to television programmes. Why does the Internet in particular incapacitate that ability to monitor children? What exactly is on the Internet that is not in the physical world? Are parents and teachers who may not be that familiar with the Internet and its culture being scaremongered into thinking that their children will be corrupted if they go online without filtering software? What is the need for filtering software in a public school if there is a supervisor? Should children be left unsupervised by an adult and supervised by software that decides what they can and can't see and that is often prejudiced against minority groups such as gays and lesbians. What do you think? Is mise le meas, Sorcha Ni hEilidhe. surveys@nua.ie"}, {"response": 7, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Tue, Jul 28, 1998 (03:58)", "body": "Protecting Your Kids From Inappropriate On-Line Material The Internet is an invaluable educational tool, but for parents, it can also be a nightmare. Here are some tips for keeping your kids away from sexually explicit websites and other questionable on-line content. - Drape your computer in terrifying slaughterhouse entrails to make it unappealing to youngsters. - Go to the favorites file in your web browser. Retitle \"Goat Porn\" folder \"Financial.\" - Young boys are understandably curious about Internet porn -- but not if you patiently explain to them that women's vaginas have razor-sharp teeth that can bite off a child's hand. - Tape pages of The Bible securely over your child's eyes, ears and mouth, then double their daily butterchurn chore-hours. - Periodically check your family computer's log-on history for any pornographic sites not visited by yourself. - Make sure your child does not use the Internet after 9 p.m. - Do not allow your kids to become desensitized to violence. Beat them harder each day. - Glue storybook pictures to your computer's monitor. Tell your child this is the Internet. - Ask yourself why, if you can't exercise even a moderate degree of control over your children, you bothered to have kids in the first place. - Write letter asking website \"Cock-Craving Asian Nympho-Teen Cum Sluts\" to tone it down a bit. - Replace your children with responsible adults. - Provide your child with a detailed list of every website he or she is not to visit. - Force your child to look at pornography for many hours straight until child begs, \"No more!\" \ufffd Copyright 1998 Onion, Inc., All rights reserved. Reprinted without permission... http://www.theonion.com/"}, {"response": 8, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Fri, Jul 31, 1998 (20:49)", "body": "****************************************************************** NUA INTERNET SURVEYS NUA INTERNET SURVEYS NUA INTERNET SURVEYS Weekly free email on what's new in surveys on the Internet By Nua Email: surveys@nua.ie Web: http://www.nua.ie/surveys/ ******************************************************************* July 27th 1998 Published By: Nua Limited Volume 3 No. 23 ******************************************************************** EDITORIAL ******************************************************************** Welcome to another weekly edition of Nua Internet Surveys. This newsletter provides information on surveys and reports on the Internet, and is brought to you by Nua - one of Europe's leading Internet consultancies and developers. Last week I discussed the concepts of filtering and blocking software, and in response to issues raised, I received considerable feedback. In light of this, I feel I should clarify some of the points made. Firstly, I am not advocating that children have unfettered access to all material online. Neither am I endorsing the propagation of pornography online under the guise of information freedom. I am not saying that parents should not bother to opt for filters. Avoiding words like mutton and lamb, I was pointing out that societies should think twice about farming out what has traditionally been the domain of individuals/family to governments. I am not interested in \"big brother\" scaremongering, I am interested in realising the right and more importantly the responsibility of the individual to choose what is moral and what is immoral. Relinquishing decisions like, \"what is ok for my children to see\" to governments who, in the interests of representing all concerned parties, will have to draw up legislation which accommodates *everyone's* concerns, will diminish the experience and destroy the ethos of the Internet. I am not interested in \"big brother\" scaremongering, I am interested in realising the right and more importantly the responsibility of the individual to choose what is moral and what is immoral. Relinquishing to the governments such decisions as \"what is ok for my children to see\", could result in the drafting of legislation which accommodates *everyone's* concerns, thus diminishes the experience and destroys the ethos of the Internet. An analogy can be drawn, albeit a frivolous one, to the Christmas Episode of the controversial *South Park* show, when the South Park mayor passes an ordinance to ban Christmas, because some residents of the community are offended by the Nativity, christmas lights, mistletoe or the consumption of turkeys. Marcia Fairweather from the US wrote to say that, 'the suggestion that the government has no business being involved is foolish. The following point is patently asinine - \"Who should monitor childrens' and public libraries' [adults] Internet activities...?\". First, these are PUBLIC institutions, they are funded by taxpayer dollars and are therefore subject to government oversight if not outright dictate. The taxpayers of THIS country have made a compact with our elected officials, we provide financial support and then elect individuals to promote and act for the public good.' Yes, this is how it's supposed to work, ideally. However, the Internet was created on the crest of a liberal wave and essentially belongs to the private sector. Perhaps now that it is increasingly publicly accessible, people feel the need to implement the rules of the wider society. However, I don't agree that a medium which is championed for its abundance of information and its accommodation of all opinions, including minority and dissident, should allow itself become a puppet in the hands of mainstream politics. Furthermore, I think it is patently clear that governments, and the U.S. government in particular would rather avoid Internet regulation. They have repeatedly pointed to the need for the private sector to agree on protocols and implement them. This has been their stance on privacy, censorship and domain registration. In the case of the Internet School Filtering Act, I think there is a case for double indemnity. As I understand it the proposed Bill will make it mandatory for those schools and public libraries applying for financial assistance to install filters on their government sponsored computers. I am assuming that the majority of schools and libraries applying for government grants are in need of financial assistance and are thus located in economically challenged areas. I am assuming that the people they service are relatively disadvantaged to begin with and do not have the resources to buy their own PCs, not to mention purchase the latest software for optimum Internet usage. The use of blocking software is likely to deprive already disadvantaged children, teenagers and adults of accessing information that under the US constitution they have a right to access. To what extent will a piece of software be able to distinguish the reference to an "}, {"response": 9, "author": "terry", "date": "Wed, Nov 11, 1998 (17:15)", "body": "Javascript Security Gap Afflicts Netscape According to Usenet posts, a Sunnyvale consultant has created a 30-line Javascript program that retrieves the content of the victim's cache. This could include sites visited and data exchanged, though probably not encrypted credit card numbers. All versions of Netscape's browser up through the latest 4.5 release are vulnerable to the hack, though Microsoft's IE is not. The script also works when read into Netscape's E-mail client. In a related article, the October Scientific American has a special section on computer security. It includes brief articles on firewalls, digital certificates, Internet cryptography, and the Java sandbox. The Java article also describes the circumstance under which a Java applet can run outside the sandbox based on a \"trusted source\" model like ActiveX. from ronks@well.com"}, {"response": 10, "author": "tami", "date": "Mon, Nov 23, 1998 (17:23)", "body": "Beware of sites offering cookies. Never accept a cookie at work - it could cost you your job. I'm surprised those holes weren't plugged ages ago. Netscape has smart people working for it. :)"}, {"response": 11, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Fri, Jun 18, 1999 (03:56)", "body": "CNET Digital Dispatch Online Security, Paranoiac's Toolkit, USB Webcams June 17, 1999 Vol. 5, No. 23 ****************************************** Not to get all girly-girly, but I must admit that I was never a big fan of worms. And as an adult, I can see that I'm even less partial to worms in my computer. If you still haven't protected your PC from the latest pestilence to plague our data, have no fear--CNET is here and we're fully stocked with worm-killing, virus-stopping downloads, help, and more. Think of us as a giant can of Raid aimed right at the malicious pests buzzing around the Internet. It's ugly business, but someone has to do it! Alice Hill VP and Editorial Director CNET Online PS--Don't forget to check out the all-new CNET Gamecenter.com. All I can say is, \"Wow.\" http://www.gamecenter.com/ Unsubscribe instructions are at the bottom of this newsletter. ***************ADVERTISEMENT************** Announcing the New Internet Standard The e.Card Platinum Visa from First USA offers 3.9% APR for 5 months, then a 9.9% fixed APR. You will receive 5% cash back for shopping with participating online merchants. Apply now for an answer in 60 seconds! http://app1.firstusa.com/card.cfm/XEC6NEC18/6TXY ****************************************** Table of Contents 1. Special Reports: Stay Safe on the Net 2. Software: Paranoiac's Toolkit 3. Gadgets: USB Webcams 4. Internet: Outlook 2000 5. Hardware: Mobile Pentium II-400 Notebooks 6. Gamecenter: The Atari 2600 in 1999 7. Web Building: FrontPage 2000 Magic 8. News : The Worm Virus 9. Shopping: Top 100 Products 10. Message Boards, CNET TV, Phantom Menace Help 11. Top ten reactions to the Worm virus 12. Subscribe and Unsubscribe ****************************************** 1. Special Reports: Stay Safe on the Net Using the Net may seem as safe as watching TV, but don't be fooled--it's still possible to get hurt if you don't take precautions. Scam artists, clever hackers, nosy bosses, and viruses are all real threats. Our Privacy and Security Topic Center gives you the tips and tools you need to stay safe online: http://home.cnet.com/category/0-3806.html?dd.cn.txt.0617.01 ****************************************** 2. Software: Paranoiac's Toolkit Feel like you're being watched? Guess what? You're right. They're poking through your files, reading your email, plucking your instant messages out of thin air, and monitoring your surfing habits. Don't let \"them\" rob your privacy: grab these 12 downloads and foil the snoopers: http://www.cnet.com/Digdispatch/dispatch423.html ***************ADVERTISEMENT************** Download the hot new XingMP3 encoder for a great price! Xing Technology's AudioCatalyst for Mac is just $29.95! http://www.beyond.com/AF99700-disdwn0615/PKSN104237/prod.htm ****************************************** 3. Gadgets: USB Webcams Now you can fulfill your urge for Hollywood-perfect videoconferencing solutions! The video quality isn't quite hologram-like yet, but it is getting better. And with USB, nightmare Webcam setups are a thing of the past. Whether it's telecommuting or just dialing up grandma, we've got a Webcam for you: http://www.cnet.com/Digdispatch/dispatch424.html ****************************************** 4. Internet: Outlook 2000 Looking for more in an email client? Install Outlook 2000, and you'll probably get much more than you expect. Like Outlook 98, Outlook 2000 packs in robust contact management and calendaring features on top of ample tools for managing your email. Find out more on Microsoft's ultimate email solution here: http://www.cnet.com/Digdispatch/dispatch425.html ****************************************** 5. Hardware: Mobile Pentium II-400 Notebooks We know you're sick of hearing about new processors from Intel, but this time it's different (we swear!). The mobile Pentium II-400 breaks the mobile land speed record big time. These new notebooks are not to be missed: http://www.cnet.com/Digdispatch/dispatch426.html ****************************************** 6. Gamecenter: The Atari 2600 in 1999 Who could ever forget the Atari 2600? Join us on a nostalgic magic-carpet ride as we revisit some of the best games ever to grace a television screen: http://www.cnet.com/Digdispatch/dispatch427.html ****************************************** 7. Web Building: FrontPage 2000 Magic Microsoft FrontPage has come a long way since it was first introduced in 1995. In addition to combining Web site management and creation into one tool, FrontPage gives Web builders the power to create sites without programming. Now in its fifth revision, FrontPage 2000 continues to evolve. To help you make the most of the product, check out our tips and tricks: http://www.cnet.com/Digdispatch/dispatch428.html ****************************************** 8. News : The Worm Virus Corporations are scrambling to cope with the new data- destroying Worm.ExploreZip, which is forcing the shutdown of email systems nationwide. In the wake of the attack by the virulent virus, th"}]}, {"num": 13, "subject": "Intranets - closed Internets", "response_count": 10, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "smckern", "date": "Tue, Nov 26, 1996 (22:03)", "body": "I have been designing closed Internets or \"Intranets\" for a few months now... it's a way that our company is linking a variety of departments by their inter-relationships. Because the Internet/Intranet interface makes things more interesting, with hyperlinks allowing immediate access to different topics, employees are more willing to take on the responsibility for communicating with each other. It's a great tool for ISO/Quality system compliance, allowing information to be updated immediately without the time-lag that is usually involved under a quality system environment. We have the technology... let's use it to make the day to day tasks easier, rather than just implementing technology for technology's sake. I would like to hear about any interesting applications that people have had for Intranets."}, {"response": 2, "author": "terry", "date": "Tue, Nov 26, 1996 (23:15)", "body": "What are some of the specific tools and software that you use to create Intranets? My friend John Miaso made extensive use of Cold Fusion in creating Intranets for 3M here in Austin. What do you think of Cold Fusion?"}, {"response": 3, "author": "smckern", "date": "Wed, Nov 27, 1996 (01:35)", "body": "I have not had a lot to do with Cold Fusion. I have simply been using MS Front Page. The new version 3.0 has just come out and it seems to have ironed out a great deal of the problems with the earlier version (Simple things like lack of spell check, etc). This is currently only in its BETA stages, but looks promising. I would be interested in the features that Cold Fusion has. I am finding that there are a lot of similarities between packages. MS Frontpage is a good way to start as it has a basic graphic design package as well."}, {"response": 4, "author": "smckern", "date": "Wed, Dec  4, 1996 (17:43)", "body": "In addition, I looked at Cold Fusion and it really doesn't help compile web pages from sctratch. It looks more at compiling the web site together after the pages have been designed (from what I saw) with another html composer. Has anyone else had any contact with Intranets and what they can be used to accomplish?"}, {"response": 5, "author": "arch1234", "date": "Wed, Dec 11, 1996 (02:37)", "body": "Hi, Well I know little about Intranet.But how it actually works I don't know.Has anybody got any white paper where U will get information about it.But listen, I am network Professional,so please give me information considering all these things. Thanks Paul for providing such nice chat. .....archana"}, {"response": 6, "author": "terry", "date": "Wed, Dec 11, 1996 (07:56)", "body": "We'll see what we can dig up on this! Check back over the weekend."}, {"response": 7, "author": "tedchong", "date": "Wed, Dec 11, 1996 (08:46)", "body": "Intranets are just internal networks running tcp/ip and standard Internet applications (like mail, www, ftp, telnet etc..) inside a big company. To find more information, first make use of web search engines or robots, my favourite is altavista.digital.com, a gaint search robot which can give you suprises :-)"}, {"response": 8, "author": "smckern", "date": "Mon, Dec 16, 1996 (21:07)", "body": "(tedchong) is absolutely correct. The good thing is that they do use standard internet applications so you can take all those people who tinker with the net at home and give them author access to their own department intranet pages. It reduces your own workload and encourages people to think about how their departments relate to others and create hyperlinks to and from their pages."}, {"response": 9, "author": "tedchong", "date": "Tue, Dec 17, 1996 (03:08)", "body": "I have been running Linux for 2 years already since I set up my first intranet in our office here. The good thing about Linux is it is free and lots of unix apps can run with no problem, only complain is no real technical support, everything has to be done on usenet postings but fortunitely, most usenet people are friendly and responsive. Now, I managed to put most office apps like leave balance, email list, address list, telephone list, name list, holiday list, weather, world time, message pad etc.. on the web server of the intranet."}, {"response": 10, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Thu, Apr 22, 1999 (17:38)", "body": "http://www.topsecretnet.com/ Top Secret Intranet How U.S. Intelligence built INTELINK The World's Largest, Most Secure Network internet conference Main Menu"}]}, {"num": 14, "subject": "security on the net", "response_count": 7, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "terry", "date": "Sun, Sep 14, 1997 (10:57)", "body": "Where to go on the net to find out about security? Well, start with the Usenix SAGE Security group, Computer Security Institute, a large number of magazines for example \"Security For Buyers of Products, Systems and Sevices\", A Canhers Publication, Computer Emergency Response Team (the ftp site ftp.cert.org), NIST has a bbs and internet site and has published a set of specs for multi-user operating systems, IEEE POSIX 1003.6 security, mainframe RACF user groups, physical security and disaster recovery. The newsgroup is comp.security.misc"}, {"response": 2, "author": "terry", "date": "Sun, Nov 30, 1997 (14:49)", "body": "This is unrelated, but don't get Webstalker from Haystack Labs confused with this: From Reuters today Anderson's Alien Theories \"X-Files\" star Gillian Anderson says she believes extraterrestrials have definitely landed -- and the authorities are covering it up. According to the New York Post, she told Allure magazine that \"It would shock the hell out of me if the government had never been involved in a UFO cover-up and if there was not life on other planets.\" She also said she believes aliens seem hostile became they are projections of our own negative vibrations. She also concedes, \"This is going to make me sound like a complete nut.\""}, {"response": 3, "author": "terry", "date": "Mon, Feb 23, 1998 (06:49)", "body": "pgp is an application that offers two main capabilities: encryption and signatures. While pgp is now well known, there is a free service that may not be as well known, that builds on pgp. It is a timestamping service. The basic idea is that when you create a pgp digital signature of a document (it can be text, but could also be a graphic file for example), that you not only sign your name but you also timestamp the signature. However, you could alter the system clock on your computer, and forge the time in order to make it appear that you had signed a file at a different time or date. The timestamping service that I mentioned above is a service intended to allow pgp users to obtain a signature and timestamp applied to their own signature and timestamp. IOW this service provides an independent timestamp that presumably no user can corrupt. As an additional layer of certification, the timestamps also include a sequential serial number, and the sequential serial numbers are apparently published weekly to provide a public record of the timestamps. And so, a user has the additional evidence that their timestamp would be bracketed by two other timestamps that they would not be able to corrupt. The url for this service is: http://www.itconsult.co.uk/stamper.htm"}, {"response": 4, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Fri, Jul 24, 1998 (21:22)", "body": "****************************************************************** NUA INTERNET SURVEYS NUA INTERNET SURVEYS NUA INTERNET SURVEYS Weekly free email on what's new in surveys on the Internet By Nua Email: surveys@nua.ie Web: http://www.nua.ie/surveys/ ******************************************************************* July 20th 1998 Published By: Nua Limited Volume 3 No. 22 ******************************************************************** EDITORIAL ******************************************************************** Welcome to another weekly edition of Nua Internet Surveys. This newsletter provides information on surveys and reports on the Internet, and is brought to you by Nua - one of Europe's leading Internet consultancies and developers. The Internet School Filtering Act, sponsored by Senator John McCain, Arizona, recommends that public libraries and schools in the US install filtering software on all machines connected to the Internet. The bill is presented as being about protecting children from stumbling on potentially harmful material. While there is clearly a growing concern among parents for the protection of children online, the bill raises more questions than it answers. The most fundamental questions are: what is harmful material and who decides what is harmful? The proposed bill begs the question, who should monitor children's and in the case of public libraries, adults' Internet activity, the US government or the parents of those children? To what extent can you ask people to behave and have the same views as others? Is blanket legislation realistic? The children that are being protected are most likely to be the children who are naturally more adept at technological navigation and it's likely that they will innovate and find ways to get around filtering software. In addition curiosity is often roused by secrecy. In the case of pornography, while it is universally available on the Net, many sites - perhaps even a majority demand a credit card number upon entry. The majority of material deemed harmful by the majority of people has to be consciously sought out online. If someone, child or adult, is seeking this kind of material out on the Internet then it's not unreasonable to suggest that they will seek it out in physical shops. If they are going to public libraries to access the Internet we can assume that they probably cannot afford their own PCs/Web TV or Internet access or they do not want to use work accounts for private Internet use. Of course this is a generalisation and there are obviously other reasons why one might have to use public computers to go online but public libraries should be just that, public. Those who use public machines to go online are fighting an uphill battle in terms of having equal acess to the most important communications medium of the late C20th and the suggestion that they should be monitored or \"babysat\" in any way is offensive. There are many problems with this bill, least of all the fundamental assumption that people need to be guided or controlled in some way, be they parents or individuals. In a very quick straw poll of my colleagues in Nua, I asked the following questions, and 15 (about half the staff) took the time to answer. [Has anyone ever been \"really offended\" by material they came accross online, either through email or surfing?] - Four said yes [Would you advocate blanket legislation for filtering content in public libraries and schools or should it be left up to individuals and parents?] - 12 said it should be left to individuals, 3 were unsure. [Does anyone think that blanket legislation for children's use of the Net is the start of a slippery slope towards controlling people's use of the Internet?] - 15 said yes. We're not a particularly paranoid bunch here at Nua but the unanimous response to the last question provides much food for thought. The implementation of blanket legislation \"for the protection of children\" is in my mind paranoid on the behalf of those who advocate it. Parents have up until now made their own decisions on what their children should or should not be exposed to, from books to television programmes. Why does the Internet in particular incapacitate that ability to monitor children? What exactly is on the Internet that is not in the physical world? Are parents and teachers who may not be that familiar with the Internet and its culture being scaremongered into thinking that their children will be corrupted if they go online without filtering software? What is the need for filtering software in a public school if there is a supervisor? Should children be left unsupervised by an adult and supervised by software that decides what they can and can't see and that is often prejudiced against minority groups such as gays and lesbians. What do you think? Is mise le meas, Sorcha Ni hEilidhe. surveys@nua.ie"}, {"response": 5, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Fri, Jul 24, 1998 (21:57)", "body": "oops...should have been in topic 12..."}, {"response": 6, "author": "terry", "date": "Tue, Aug 25, 1998 (20:00)", "body": "An amusing trojan horse that may be spreading around the net: http://www.thetopoftheworld.com/spartanhorse"}, {"response": 7, "author": "terry", "date": "Fri, Jan 15, 1999 (15:51)", "body": "Uh-oh *8-/ http://www.economictimes.com/120199/lead2.htm Red alert issued against US network software Mayur Shetty MUMBAI 11 JANUARY The [Indian] Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) has issued a 'red alert' against all network security software developed in the US. And the Central Vigilance Commissioner, N Vittal, is following up on the warning - he might make it mandatory for all Indian banks and financial institutions to buy only software developed in India. The DRDO's concern about US-developed software stems from one basic insecurity - the data traffic and network security software that comes from the US can be easily hacked into and could prove to be a security hazard. Currently US software vendors can export only those \"encryption software products\" that can be 'broken' by the US National Security Agency. This makes the quality of the US software exported to India doubtful from a security point of view. In a letter to the CVC, the centre for artificial intelligence of the DRDO, Bangalore, has said that it has begun to develop secure communication tools and will have an indigenous prototype in place in three months. The CVC is expected to wait for the final product before deciding on the action to be taken. The centre has developed software tools that protect wide area networks from hostile attackers. It is also developing software tools for protecting traffic passing through the network. \"The encryption part of the software is complete and only the communication protocols remain to be written,\" the DRDO unit's letter says. \"Since the software has been written by ourselves, there is no upper limit on the security level provided by the encryption in the software exported from the USA,\" it added. Pointing out the defects in imported software, the letter says that the present 'firewall' products on sale by commercial vendors incorporate only rudimentary packet level filtering. These can be compromised easily. It also points out that as per US law, \"no encryption software products can be exported from the US if they are too strong to be broken by the US National Security Agency\". The letter says: \"To put it bluntly, only insecure software can be exported. When various multinational companies go around peddling 'secure communication software' products to gullible Indian customers, they conveniently neglect to mention this aspect of the US export law. \"Another related point is that when we buy an imported software product that is a 'black box' to us, we cannot be sure that the software package does not contain a time bomb of sorts, to cause havoc to the network when an external command is issued by a hostile nation.\" Mr Vittal is also believed to have agreed to this and said he was in favour of working towards developing the indigenous software within three to four months. However, banks are yet to receive any directive from the CVC on this issue. --- # distributed via nettime-l : no commercial use without permission # is a closed moderated mailinglist for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: majordomo@desk.nl and \"info nettime-l\" in the msg body # URL: http://www.desk.nl/~nettime/ contact: nettime-owner@desk.nl internet conference Main Menu"}]}, {"num": 15, "subject": "WIN/QVTNET40", "response_count": 0, "posts": []}, {"num": 16, "subject": "newsgroups", "response_count": 27, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "terry", "date": "Sat, Jan  4, 1997 (15:17)", "body": "Q: How many USENET users does it take to change a light bulb? A: 435,235 1 to change the bulb 4 to tell him he should have done it differently 365 to point out spelling/grammar errors in first 5 posts 1834 to flame the spell checkers 4598 to correct spelling in spelling flames 6785 to say please move to alt.spelling.lite.bulb 15,467 to say stop cross posting to soc.women and alt.rape.all.men.are.scum, alt.adoption, and s.a.a.(m) 23,456 to endlessly debate which method is superior 236,789 to concatenate all articles to date, then quote them, only to say, \"Me Too\" 106,345 to quote the \"Me Toos\" to say, \"Me Three\" 1 to propose new alt.change.lite.bulb newsgroup 89,345 to say this is just what alt.physic.cold_fusion was meant for, leave it here 10,584 votes for alt.lite.bulb"}, {"response": 2, "author": "tedchong", "date": "Sat, Jan  4, 1997 (22:41)", "body": "I think people read newsgroups for their own interests, like me, I tend to read my local (Singapore related) newsgroups first, like sg.marketplace and soc.culture.singapore. But I also read computer related newsgroups like linux, windows95 and unix groups. I like tin because it is fast, clean and easy to use. I tried Agent but I don't like it, when you read many newsgroups (like 100) the hard disk space drops very fast... Also the problem with usenet news is very hard to find a fast, reliable and good NNTP server. just my .2 cent"}, {"response": 3, "author": "terry", "date": "Sat, Jan  4, 1997 (23:23)", "body": "What are they talking about on singapore.general these days. Which topic has the most responses? What's the Internet scene like in Singapore in general?"}, {"response": 4, "author": "tedchong", "date": "Sun, Jan  5, 1997 (04:13)", "body": "The most talk about tropic was the General Election 1997, which was ended on Jan 2nd. The US even said some comments on Singapore Election which the ruling party (People Action Party, PAP) links voting to upgrading of public housing, ie vote buying and money politic. To bas bad the oppositions only managed to win only 2 seats out of 83 seats and PAP has absolute majority for the next 5 years. Here everything is owned and controlled by the government (PAP) including the Internet, they force all users to use the gaint proxy farm to block access to political and prono sites on the Internet, they can do this because they controll all the ISPs here. Just for your info Singapore pays its ministers very well because the government is PAP, a cabinet minister is paid US$1 million a year before bonuses or perks. The Prime Minister is getting US$ 1.5 millions a years. Things in Singapore are also the most expensive in the world, a new 1,600cc Japanese sedan car is US$70,000 on the road, a 1,000 sq.ft public house (99-year lease, high rise) is US$250,000 and unlimited Internet access is about US$120 a month. Well, Singapore is definitely not for the poor... sad."}, {"response": 5, "author": "terry", "date": "Sun, Jan  5, 1997 (09:38)", "body": "But are wages correspondingly high? Ted, would you mind creating a Singapore topic in our travel conference and invite some of your fellow Singaporeans (?) to join it?"}, {"response": 6, "author": "tedchong", "date": "Sun, Jan  5, 1997 (18:35)", "body": "Wages for most people are not high, still lag behind Hongkong, US and Japan. Average computer engineer with 3 years experience earns about $35000 a year. Okay I will create a Singapore tropic in the travel tropic soon."}, {"response": 7, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Oct 29, 1999 (17:09)", "body": "Did he? I use NewsAgent. Very good with a jillion options for subscription - a lot of which you would not want your mother to know about - or your children!"}, {"response": 8, "author": "terry", "date": "Fri, Oct 29, 1999 (19:51)", "body": "I use tin, which we have on our system. Ted Chong uses the spring for newsgroups only and is the master of tin. tedchong@spring.net can tell you about our newsgroup server, which is really ddc's."}, {"response": 9, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Oct 29, 1999 (20:44)", "body": "Thanks...I shall contact him at the first chance and see what he thinks. I appreciate your answering my cry in the wilderness for advice."}, {"response": 10, "author": "terry", "date": "Sat, Oct 30, 1999 (04:28)", "body": "dejanews.com is now deja.com I believe."}, {"response": 11, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Sat, Oct 30, 1999 (11:55)", "body": "I have noticed that most of the users use dejanews though I have the one I do because it was the one my son uses...are they all more or less the same?"}, {"response": 12, "author": "terry", "date": "Sun, Oct 31, 1999 (10:16)", "body": "Pretty much. Stroud has a bunch of newsgroup readers on his site."}, {"response": 13, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Nov  5, 1999 (15:12)", "body": "I noticed. They borrow freely one from another, it appears!"}, {"response": 14, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Sun, Feb 13, 2000 (00:32)", "body": "Since ddc is no more for Spring (amen!) who is the official newsgroup now?"}, {"response": 15, "author": "sprin5", "date": "Sun, Feb 13, 2000 (08:09)", "body": "Good question. I'm not even sure if the new location has newsgroups. Ted would be able to tell you if there other free newsgroup servers out there, there must be umpteen of them. Maybe you could do a net search on free newsgroup servers and let us know what it turns up, perhaps?"}, {"response": 16, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Sun, Feb 13, 2000 (13:28)", "body": "I shall do that for you. Did the one I use cost me? I don't remember. I'll certainly check ASAP."}, {"response": 17, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Sun, Feb 13, 2000 (19:49)", "body": "http://www.freenntp.com/ has lots of things free, including his own stuff. It is also part of the Public News Servers Web Ring. http://www.webring.org/cgi-bin/webring?ring=nntp;list lists the sites on this ring. There are lots of them there suggesting that it might be easier for those involved in actually choosing this item to check it out, whereas if I do it, you are going to have to take my word for it, or something. Not sure you want to do that!"}, {"response": 18, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Sun, Feb 13, 2000 (19:54)", "body": "http://serverwatch.internet.com/newsservers.html has a list of free news servers none of which I have ever heard of (no big thing, that!) and download links to them as well as to Outlook, Agent, and Express. This list of server links: Cassandra DNEWS News Server INN News Server NetRoad NewsServer Netscape Collabra Server NewsChannel Newstand nDaemon"}, {"response": 19, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Tue, Feb 15, 2000 (22:34)", "body": "If I bother to go through all of the news servers and write the pros and cons and present them here, will that benefit anyone other than me? Will anyone be interested in what there is out there? I make new topics and post interesting things all over Spring, but maybe they are only interesting to me, Alexander said. So, if I am using up this conference space with all of the free news servers and you don't need that, please advise. It would be nice to talk to someone other than to myself."}, {"response": 20, "author": "sprin5", "date": "Wed, Feb 16, 2000 (06:50)", "body": "Do some of these carry austin.general and austin.forsale?"}, {"response": 21, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Wed, Feb 16, 2000 (11:55)", "body": "Let me check and get back to you. I am loading Agent at the moment; then i will check through the urls above to hunt for others which might. I also have access to usenet through telnet on Hawaii on Line. I'll also check there for you. I am always happy to be of help On Agent I found 16 with Austin in the title. austin.food, austin.forsale, austin.jobs, and austin.general among them."}, {"response": 22, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Wed, Feb 16, 2000 (14:05)", "body": "These are the ones I found on Usenet on Hawaii-on-Line N 11 K austin.announce ??? (Moderated) N 11 K austin.autos Care and (mis)use of automobi N 11 K austin.flame Flamefesting followup for Aus N 11 K austin.food Eating, cooking, and culinary N 11 K austin.forsale Items for sale in Austin, TX. N 11 K austin.gardening Austin and USDA Zone 8 garden N 11 K austin.general Items of general interest in N 11 K austin.internet Discussion of Internet issues N 11 K austin.jobs Jobs available, wanted, and d N 11 K austin.music Music around Austin, TX. N 11 K austin.org.sca The Society for Creative Anac N 11 K austin.politics Political issues in Austin, T N 11 K austin.talk Talk in Austin, TX. N 11 K austin.test Usenet testing in Austin, TX. N 11 K austin.usenet.config No description. N 11 K austin.usenet.stats No description."}, {"response": 23, "author": "sprin5", "date": "Wed, Feb 16, 2000 (17:42)", "body": "Those are the good ones."}, {"response": 24, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Wed, Feb 16, 2000 (17:56)", "body": "It appears that most of the big newsgroups have those Austin topics. It just takes forever to get through the alt.binary stuff (talk about educational?!)to get to them."}, {"response": 25, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Wed, Feb 16, 2000 (23:19)", "body": "Shall I check out specific places to download these Free newsgroups using the Austin criteria as a gauge of worthiness for Spring? Or, is there something else you would rather have me doing?"}, {"response": 26, "author": "sprin5", "date": "Fri, Feb 18, 2000 (07:22)", "body": "Maybe post some pointers to the spring on some newsgroups, subtly of course."}, {"response": 27, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Feb 18, 2000 (12:19)", "body": "Hmmm...Of course, Subtly. To http://www.spring.net or to /public/main? Next is to wade through 30,000+ groups to see which ones might attract the right sort of people...A daunting job at best! I'll do it! internet conference Main Menu"}]}, {"num": 17, "subject": "DCC bugs in mIRC 4.7", "response_count": 0, "posts": []}, {"num": 18, "subject": "spam", "response_count": 5, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "terry", "date": "Mon, Feb 10, 1997 (05:55)", "body": "http://www.vix.com/spam/ is the site that lists some of the worst of the spammers."}, {"response": 2, "author": "terry", "date": "Mon, Feb 10, 1997 (05:55)", "body": "The list of \"Rogue Sites\" is at http://www.vix.com/spam/rogues.html"}, {"response": 3, "author": "terry", "date": "Mon, Feb 10, 1997 (06:00)", "body": "From the newsgroup: ====== Y'all: I've made a fairly comprehensive listing of procmail UCE filters, based largely on the listings published recently to n.a.n-a.e by Sam Trenholme, available on my website. They may be accessed at: http://www.insync.net/~ganymede/rc.spam.pub Note that in order to make these spam filters as \"portable\" as possible, I've set the action for all of my spam recipes to simply filing the spam into a folder \"IN.spam\". I've kept each individual filter separate because my personal version of these spam filters does other things with UCE that I receive -- different things for different senders. I've also done an nslookup or dig on as many of the sites sending UCE as I could, and noted when a site is apparently down. I make no warranties of suitability or fitness for any particular purpose -- caveat emptor and all that. How you use these is strictly your responsibility. Cheers Greg R. Broderick"}, {"response": 4, "author": "edy", "date": "Mon, Apr 14, 1997 (15:46)", "body": "To krisg. Somewhere in win95, the default file association for HTML files is Microsoft Internet Explorer. That's what this sounds like to me. Sounds like you mean that you save a document from the web and when you try to open it afterward, IE opens instead of Netscape. If this is the case, do this: 1.Use Windows Explorer (the one that shows you what you have on your hard drive). 2.Find the file you want to open, or any HTML file. 3.Choose \"File\"-- \"Open With\" and follow the menu till you see Netscape. I think that should be it. (I just upgrade to win95 last week)."}, {"response": 5, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Wed, May 20, 1998 (06:27)", "body": "(1) SENATE PASSES CONGRESS' FIRST EFFORT TO ADDRESS UNSOLICITED COMMERCIAL EMAIL On May 12 the Senate passed Congress' first effort to clamp down on senders of unsolicited commercial email messages (UCE), popularly called 'spam' or 'junk email.' CDT believes that this bill is a measured first step in addressing the issue of spam. But there are several issues that need to be addressed before final passage. The current definition of 'unsolicited commercial email,' for example, unconstitutionally restricts unsolicited anonymous political speech. We've communicated this concern to the bill's sponsors, Senators. Frank Murkowski (R-Alaska) and Robert G. Torricelli (D-N.J.), and we will work to see that this concern is addressed in the final version of the legislation. For the letter, see: http://www.cdt.org/spam/cdtletter.html We also recognize that in the future additional steps may be needed, depending on how well this first attempt to deal legislatively with the problem works. Sens. Murkowski and Torricelli's bill requires those who send unsolicited commercial email to: ** identify themselves and provide accurate contact information within the body of their email message; ** provide accurate routing information; and ** stop sending email messages upon the request of a recipient. The bill gives several different parties the right to bring legal action against the senders of unsolicited commercial email. Those parties include: ** The Federal Trade Commission, which may fine anyone who violates the law up to $15,000, and may seek an injunction that prohibits the violator from sending more spam;. ** State Attorneys General, who may bring lawsuits on behalf of the residents of their state to get an injunction against the transmission of more unsolicited commercial email, force the sender to comply with the law, and obtain damages and 'other appropriate relief' from the sender for the harm it caused by sending unwanted commercial email; and ** Internet Service Providers who have been harmed by people who use their services to send spam may also bring a lawsuit to get an injunction and to obtain damages and other appropriate relief. ISPs may be awarded up to $15,000 for each violation of the law through the use of their service. The court may also force the violator to pay the ISP's attorney fees, as long as they are reasonable, and court costs. By allowing the courts to shift the cost of a successful lawsuit off ISPs, and onto the shoulders of the spam senders themselves,the bill may encourage more ISPs to pursue spammers. The bill gives the FTC, the State Attorneys General and the Internet service providers the power to enforce the law's provisions. The bill also retains the states' abilities to enact additional legislation or to employ existing consumer protection laws to address unsolicited commercial email. S. 1618 avoids many of the thorny questions regarding speech and Internet service liability raised by earlier proposals. While the bill is only a beginning, CDT believes it will have an impact on the unscrupulous people who are clogging the email system with unwanted messages. This bill won't eliminate unsolicited commercial email, but it will enable individual Internet users and Internet service providers to exercise more control over a problem they have so far found to be almost unworkable. It will ensure that people who send spam will hear back from consumers who don't want to get it. The issue of unsolicited commercial email will remain active in the policy arena. First, the Senate Commerce Committee has tentatively scheduled a hearing on this issue on June 17th. Second, the Ad Hoc Working Group on Unsolicited Commercial Email, which CDT convened last fall at the request of the FTC, is also due to release its report soon. CDT coordinated the drafting of the report, which, as we told Sens. Murkowski and Torricelli, found consensus in a desire to: a) maximize individual email users' control over the information that enters their in-box; b) ensure that costs were not imposed unfairly upon end users, and Internet and online service providers; and c) increase the enforcement of existing FTC regulations and state laws on 'unfair, deceptive and misleading commercial statements' in a way that protects the First Amendment right to free speech. Meanwhile, the text of S. 1618 is available on Sen. Murkowski's Web site, at: http://www.senate.gov/~murkowski/commercialemail/EMailAmendText.html A companion bill, H.R. 3888, was introduced in the House by Rep.Billy Tauzin (R-La.) on May 14. The text is not yet available online. internet conference Main Menu"}]}, {"num": 19, "subject": "Dial-Up WINSOCKs  -  Quarterdeck mpkernel.exe  was best dialer I've ever seen", "response_count": 0, "posts": []}, {"num": 2, "subject": "telnet", "response_count": 13, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "tedchong", "date": "Tue, Dec 10, 1996 (00:19)", "body": "The telnet program from win95 is crap and very basic. Forbetter telnet apps for windows, visit http://www.windows95.com/apps/terminals.html and lots of free and shareware apps. I use crt and netterm to telnet to this bbs"}, {"response": 2, "author": "terry", "date": "Tue, Dec 10, 1996 (00:55)", "body": "That's what I use, crt."}, {"response": 3, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Oct 29, 1999 (17:55)", "body": "Is crt still the telnet program of choice? I am seriously considering making mine better than what Bill Gates allows me \"for free\""}, {"response": 4, "author": "terry", "date": "Fri, Oct 29, 1999 (20:47)", "body": "By all means, you'll be making a quantum leap. CRT is what I use. Need I say more? Read the review in our apps conference. Or download it at http://www.stroud.com my old buddy Forrest Stroud's site!"}, {"response": 5, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Oct 29, 1999 (21:27)", "body": "I shall - just needed an updated comment from the one which was a few years old. Thanks, Terry!"}, {"response": 6, "author": "terry", "date": "Sat, Oct 30, 1999 (05:27)", "body": "You'll love CRT if you've been limping along with the Microsoft telnet client. Set your scrollback buffer to 9999 (under options/session preferences/emulation and under scripts you can set your username and password."}, {"response": 7, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Sat, Oct 30, 1999 (12:51)", "body": "Excellent! Thank you. I have set the font so I can actually see it (twas in 6 or 8pt type to start) and a few other options. It does glide along much more smoothly and I am sure Mr Stroud will be $30 richer by the end of the month. Thanks for the suggestions - I am just sorry I did not read this before now...but 14 hours a day just leave a little time for new conferences. I'm getting there, though! Ok just set the buffer for 9999 and entered my login and password. Man that makes it so swift and easy. Much Mahalo!"}, {"response": 8, "author": "terry", "date": "Sun, Oct 31, 1999 (11:15)", "body": "Stroud won't get any richer. But the CRT folks will. It's worth it, because it's so useful. Do you notice how quickly you can go through your conference list? I wish we could make it this easy for folks on the web!"}, {"response": 9, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Nov  5, 1999 (15:44)", "body": "I have all but GenX and one other, I think, on my conference list so I can catch all of the posts. However, until I learn the command for CRT to back up and erase my mistyping, and I learn how to enlarge the print on my screen, this is going to be more slow-going than necessary. It is not as jerky and slow to show what you have typed, and that is a huge plus. On the web it is easier to go back through several posts to see just what the last comment was all about. If you do not have that ability, or do not know how to enable it, you end (I end ) up posting something irrelevant and often very stupid-sounding. There are still a lot of folks just learning Windows, and the slower, the better for them! Still and all, CRT is lovely stuff. What is netterm to which Ted Chong referred?"}, {"response": 10, "author": "terry", "date": "Sat, Nov  6, 1999 (11:51)", "body": "In CRT you can scroll back through you can scrool back through your buffer (using the scroll bar or page up and page down keys) and read the previous posts. You can do this even if you are in an editor. In telnet sessions you can use either vi, pico (easer), or joe as an editor. There's a native editor that comes with yapp that lett's you see whta's been said before but it's crude for long postings. For short one liners it's great."}, {"response": 11, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Sat, Nov  6, 1999 (16:13)", "body": "Ah, thanks for that. I appreciate your input any time, any where on any thing!"}, {"response": 12, "author": "terry", "date": "Sat, Nov  6, 1999 (19:19)", "body": "You got it!"}, {"response": 13, "author": "cfadm", "date": "Wed, Jun 28, 2006 (15:07)", "body": "That's good. internet conference Main Menu"}]}, {"num": 20, "subject": "T1 Link", "response_count": 2, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "terry", "date": "Mon, May 19, 1997 (18:02)", "body": "Try a traceroute and print it out here ok?"}, {"response": 2, "author": "tedchong", "date": "Thu, May 22, 1997 (14:10)", "body": "It's better today, my traceroute to www.spring.com as follows: traceroute to www.spring.com (207.113.199.204), 30 hops max, 40 byte packets 1 apso-gw (203.127.205.1) 1 ms 1 ms 1 ms 2 165.21.17.230 (165.21.17.230) 23 ms 45 ms 13 ms 3 kallang.singnet.com.sg (165.21.80.8) 13 ms 14 ms 13 ms 4 borderx1-hssi3-0.LosAngeles.mci.net (204.70.170.105) 255 ms 209 ms 215 ms 5 core2-fddi-0.LosAngeles.mci.net (204.70.170.49) 231 ms 210 ms 316 ms 6 core1-hssi-2.SanFrancisco.mci.net (204.70.1.153) 229 ms 273 ms 218 ms 7 bordercore3-loopback.SanFrancisco.mci.net (166.48.16.1) 227 ms 252 ms 224 ms 8 pb-nap.crl.net (198.32.128.20) 226 ms 229 ms 242 ms 9 bastrop.atm.us.crl.net (165.113.56.90) 296 ms 318 ms 313 ms 10 207.113.199.204 (207.113.199.204) 338 ms 303 ms 310 ms a internet conference Main Menu"}]}, {"num": 21, "subject": "wireless Internet for Austin", "response_count": 4, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "terry", "date": "Tue, Nov 25, 1997 (19:02)", "body": "Topic 15 [wireless]: Wireless IP: New alternatives to leased lines #544 of 545: Paul Terry http://www.spring.com/yapp.html (terry) Tue Nov 25 '97 (07:04) 3 lines I'd be interested in more details on the waveland stuff Steve. I'm still scratching my head on how to do a wireless setup for Austin to my isp that others could share. Any more ideas Dave? Topic 15 [wireless]: Wireless IP: New alternatives to leased lines #545 of 545: Dave Hughes (dave) Tue Nov 25 '97 (08:31) 57 lines Its really pretty basic terry. For the crudest rule of thumbm assume that connecting up wirelessly anyone to your ISP system who is 5 miles or less away is pretty easy, between 5 and 15, harder, and over 15 hardest. Then decide who are you trying to hook up at what (as an acceptable minimum) throughput speeds. Knowing the cheapest way for starters is to assume a base radio - at your ISP location - will operate up to T-1 half duplex. Which could handle 24 simultaneous 56kbps sessions. So you then look at radios, like Breezecoms, where one 'Access Point' at the base, connected into your system via an ethernet connection (or thru a hub) can be connected to X number of 'Bridge' units - all acting like one big LAN. And systematically after you connect up the Access Point to as high gain an omni antenna as high as you can get it on your roof above your system, take Brigde units to each customer's premises and see if you can get a link, carrying a small omni, or yagi, to point back to the AP as the case may be. Knowing that the ethernet coming out the bcak of the radio can run up to hundreds of feet without serious loss. So if you get 3 customers with Bridges, which cost you about $1,800 apiece, the AP about $1,400 - their radios talking to be base radio (little green link lights on all), then all thats left is connecting them by their ethernet to their radio, giving them IP addresses, and they are connected. In this configuration with those radios, acting as extensions to your LAN, each user will be able to use up to the highest thruput of your radios, expecting at least 512kbps each. Degrading only as more users share the same base radio thruput. So figure out what to charge them since you will not require phoneline at your end, serving them. Alternatively, if where your system is is *not* central enough to radiate out to your intended customers, then you can find a tall building which is more central, and between which you can see/reach by a pair of radios. Then make a deal with the building management to put an omni antenna on their roof, run the RF cable to the top floor where, inside you can get wall power and put the radio, put the *Access Point* radio there (one AP can talke to many WBs), and connect up your Bridge radio first to get a good link, and connected up as many others at customers premises who can see/link to the high antenna and access point. (no computer needed there, for the AP just receives and relays traffic). The effective throughput will be halved to maybe 512kbps, but thats hardly a problem when its free secure, digital communications unaffected by weather. While the radios may differ, the principles I have laid out above stay pretty much the same."}, {"response": 2, "author": "terry", "date": "Wed, Nov 26, 1997 (15:52)", "body": "can you put repeaters in the get over the 15 mile being hard ? Topic 15 [wireless]: Wireless IP: New alternatives to leased lines #547 of 547: Dave Hughes (dave) Tue Nov 25 '97 (15:30) 22 lines Yes, most of the radios can act as a relay - though you can get slow downs from latency if you relay more than twice. Usually the over 15 being hard is a matter of the difficulty of getting a clean line of sight that far, and the farther you go, with the 1 watt FCC limitations, the cleaner that line must be. Now the BreezeCom units operate at only 50 milliwatts of power - 1/20th of a watt - because the Isralis made them for the European market, which limits to 1 watt. So they really don't operate well over 7 miles. While Solectek makes a 2Mbps radio rated at 25 miles, 1 watt. I'm trying to line up the Four Republican Horseman of the Senate's Science & Technology Committee - Stevens of Alaska, Burns of Montana, Dorgan of North Dakota, McCain of Arizona, all of whom are from rural states where connectivity to small towns and schools is costly by telcos - to ask the new FCC CHairman why 5 Watts is unacceptable for rural America. There is hardly a case for excessive 'interference' for eskimo villages in the north, served by a satellite internet feed, to reach the 50 mile surroundung area."}, {"response": 3, "author": "terry", "date": "Wed, Nov 26, 1997 (22:26)", "body": "Dave Hughes (dave) Wed Nov 26 '97 (11:50) 9 lines Yes, but the professional site-survey is critical. What you want for any link that may turn out to be marginal, is a visit by a radio enginner from Solectek, or a local reseller, using a spectrum analyzer, to see whether, between these two points (1) get a good link (2) how robust it will be (3) what potential interference there might be. On such a long stretch you might be paying for a one day survey that tells you it won't work well enough to spend the money for the radios/antennas and installation."}, {"response": 4, "author": "terry", "date": "Fri, Jan 15, 1999 (11:56)", "body": "From Katie mailto://mirmir@well.com here are some wireless services, you might show to your closest and most entrepreneurial isp, for duplication or franchise/setup: http://www.cyberhighway.net/news/wireless.html http://www.wirelesstcp.net/fastest/wireless.htm a great many wireline isps are adding a wireless service. internet conference Main Menu"}]}, {"num": 22, "subject": "Cyberwar: The Information Revolution and Warfare", "response_count": 6, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "terry", "date": "Fri, Feb 27, 1998 (11:54)", "body": "Here we go (Bruce Sterling uncovered this): From mf@mediafilter.org Tue Feb 24 14:50:16 1998 Date: Tue, 24 Feb 1998 14:50:16 -0500 To: nettime-l@Desk.nl From: mf@mediafilter.org (MediaFilter) Subject: CryptoGate, from CAQ Sender: owner-nettime-l@basis.Desk.nl Precedence: bulk X-UIDL: 543f05bc0c3da454ac1735ca6fc7a5eb Crypto AG: The NSA's Trojan Whore? by Wayne Madsen FOR AT LEAST HALF A CENTURY, THE US HAS BEEN INTERCEPTING AND DECRYPTING THE TOP SECRET DOCUMENTS OF MOST OF THE WORLD'S GOVERNMENTS It may be the greatest intelligence scam of the century: For decades, the US has routinely intercepted and deciphered top secret encrypted messages of 120 countries. These nations had bought the world's most sophisticated and supposedly secure commercial encryption technology from Crypto AG, a Swiss company that staked its reputation and the security concerns of its clients on its neutrality. The purchasing nations, confident that their communications were protected, sent messages from their capitals to embassies, military missions, trade offices, and espionage dens around the world, via telex, radio, teletype, and facsimile. They not only conducted sensitive albeit legal business and diplomacy, but sometimes strayed into criminal matters, issuing orders to assassinate political leaders, bomb commercial buildings, and engage in drug and arms smuggling. All the while, because of a secret agreement between the National Security Agency (NSA) and Crypto AG, they might as well have been hand delivering the message to Washington. Their Crypto AG machines had been rigged so that when customers used them, the random encryption key could be automatically and clandestinely transmitted with the enciphered message. NSA analysts could read the message traffic as easily as they could the morning newspaper. [...] >From CAQ #63 http://caq.com/cryptogate --- # distributed via nettime-l : no commercial use without permission # is a closed moderated mailinglist for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: majordomo@icf.de and \"info nettime\" in the msg body # URL: http://www.desk.nl/~nettime/ contact: nettime-owner@icf.de"}, {"response": 2, "author": "terry", "date": "Fri, Feb 27, 1998 (11:56)", "body": "Military-Entertainment Complex Trembles in Fear as Modem-Wielding Pomo Contingent Gets Hip to RAND *8-/ From rdom@thing.net Thu Feb 26 13:48:47 1998 Date: Thu, 26 Feb 1998 13:48:47 -0800 From: ricardo dominguez To: nettime-l@Desk.nl Subject: infowar thread on www.thing.net Sender: owner-nettime-l@basis.Desk.nl Precedence: bulk X-UIDL: 6eafa74e7e813486ded1386d1b709582 InfoWar \"War in our current era is one of reduced tangibility and soft power.\" --Joseph Nye. \"Centralize strategically, but decentralize tactically.\" --Mao This is an invitation to join and participate on the InfoWar thread moderated by Ricardo Dominguez on the new Thing bbs system at: http://www.thing.net starting on March 5, 1998. The InfoWar thread will consider how soft power has redefined command, control, intelligence and resistance. InfoWar tactics are now moving beyond the theoretical questions about the rise of \"network power\" and the end of hierarchies. Instead, Military and Intelligence groups are now experimenting with pragmatic hybrid structures that can retain control over networks, while allowing network autonomy to expand within a specific types of command structures. In order to contain the rising soft power of small groups that can organize themselves \"into sprawling networks\" that can threaten hard power structures. Military and Intelligence communities since the late 80's have mapped 5 distinct possible structures for understanding InfoWar: 1)A Game, chess or Go. Go has displaced chess as the dominant tactical game metaphor. 2)The Wild West. Each town makes its own laws and out on the range its everyone for themselves and God against all. 3)The Castle/Bunker. Enclaves built for security with moats, massive walls, drawbridges and loyal Knights who roam the outskirts of the fiefdom. 4)A Plant. A rhizome made of endless root-structures,with poly-spacial connectivity, and a multi-layered linkages with non-plant agents. 5)The Hive. A bio-diverse system,with the ability to rapidly mutate, and capable of swarm like activity. Each map calls for different types of responses to the questions of security, aggression, and resistance. What can we gain from each map as the importance of InfoWar continues to grow with greater global access. The thread will also consider the specific case of the Zapatistas in Chiapas, Mexico. They have been able to constrain the Mexican government from quickly eliminating the movement since 1994--by building a transnational network of resistance. How were a group of Mayan people deep in the Lacandona jungle able to become the first, \"post modern warriors?\" And finally, what happens when War Theory goes beyond InfoWar to overcome the problems that arise from the \"age of networks?\" Suggested reading list -- (not necessary to have read them to participate): Copernicus....Forward C4I for the 21st Century http://www.stl.nps.navy.mil/c4i/coperfwd.txt Cyberwar is Coming. Arquilla and Ronfeldt http://gopher.well.sf.ca.us:70/0/Military/cyberwar Electronic Warfare http://www.dreo.dnd.ca/pages/electwf/electwf.htm Guide to Information Warfare http://www.uta.fi/~ptmakul/infowar/iw2.html In Athena's Camp (John Arquilla and David Ronfeldt, editors) http://www.rand.org/publications/MR/MR880/contents.html Information War and Cyberspace Security by RAND http://www.rand.org/publications/RRR/RRR.fall95.cyber/ Information War Cyberwar Netwar by George J. Stein http://www.cdsar.af.mil/battle/chp6.html Information Warfare http://vislab-www.nps.navy.mil/~sdjames/info_war.html What is Information Warfare? http://www.ndu.edu/ndu/inss/actpubs/act003/a003cont.html Zapatistas The Zapatistas and the Electronic Fabric of Struggle http://www.eco.utexas.edu/faculty/Cleaver/zaps.html Netwars http://www.teleport.com/~jwehling/Netwars.html Zaptistas in Cyberspace. http://www.eco.utexas.edu:80/Homepages/Faculty/Cleaver/zapsincyber.html Latin America's first post-Communism rebellion http://mprofaca.cro.net/chiapas.html Electronic Civil Disobedience http://mailer.fsu.edu/~sbarnes/ECD/ECD.html --- # distributed via nettime-l : no commercial use without permission # is a closed moderated mailinglist for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: majordomo@icf.de and \"info nettime\" in the msg body # URL: http://www.desk.nl/~nettime/ contact: nettime-owner@icf.de"}, {"response": 4, "author": "terry", "date": "Sat, Feb 28, 1998 (12:51)", "body": "From: Geert Lovink Message-Id: Subject: ars 98 on Infowar To: nettime-l@Desk.nl Date: Tue, 20 Jan 1998 12:40:39 +0100 (MET) INFOWAR In 1998, under the banner of \"INFO WAR\", the Ars Electronica Festival of Art, Technology and Society, is appealing to artists, theoreticians and technologists for contributions relating to the social and political definition of the information society. The emphasis here will lie not on technological flights of fancy, but on the fronts drawn up in a society that is in a process of fundamental and violent upheaval. The information society - no longer a vague promise of a better future, but a reality and a central challenge of the here-and-now - is founded upon the three key technologies of electricity, telecommunications and computers: Technologies developed for the purposes, and out of the logic, of war, technologies of simultaneity and coherence, keeping our civilian society in a state of permanent mobilisation driven by the battle for markets, resources and spheres of influence. A battle for supremacy in processes of economic concentration, in which the fronts, no longer drawn up along national boundaries and between political systems, are defined by technical standards. A battle in which the power of knowledge is managed as a profitable monopoly of its distribution and dissemination. The latest stock market upheavals have laid bare the power of a global market, such as only the digital revolution could have fathered, and which must be counted as the latter=BCs most widely-felt direct outcome. The digitally-networked market of today wields more power than the politicians. Governments are losing their say in the international value of their currencies; they can no longer control, but only react. The massive expansion of freely-accessible communication networks, itself a global economic necessity, imposes severe constraints on the arbitrary restriction of information flows. Any transgression of a critical control functions in the cybertechnologies=BC sphere of responsibility and influence puts central power wielders in a hitherto unheard-of position of vulnerability and openness to attack. The geographic frontiers of the industrial age are increasingly losing their erstwhile significance in global politics, and giving way to vertical fronts along social stratifications. Whereas, in the past, war was concerned with the conquering of territory, and later with the control of production capacities, war in the 21st century is entirely concerned with the acquisition and exercise of power over knowledge. The three fronts of land, sea and air battles have been joined by a fourth, being set up within the global information systems. Spurred on by the \"successes\" of the Gulf war, the development of information warfare is running at full speed. Increasingly, the attention of the military strategists is turning away from computer-aided warfare - >from potentiation of the destructive efficiency of military operations through the application of information technology, virtual reality and high-tech weaponry - to cyberwar, whose ultimate target is nothing less than the global information infrastructure itself: annihilation of the enemy=BCs computer and communication systems, obliteration of his databases, destruction of his command and control systems. Yet increasingly the vital significance of the global information infrastructure for the functioning of the international finance markets compels the establishment of new strategic objectives: not obliteration, but manipulation, not destruction, but infiltration and assimilation. \"Netwar\" as the tactical deployment of information and disinformation, targeted at human understanding. These new forms of post-territorial conflicts, however, have for some time now ceased to be preserve of governments and their ministers of war. NGOs, hackers, computer freaks in the service of organised crime, and terrorist organisations with high-tech expertise are now the chief actors in the cyberguerilla nightmares of national security services and defence ministries. In 1998, under the banner of \"INFO WAR\", the Ars Electronica Festival of Art, Technology and Society, is appealing to artists, theoreticians and technologists for contributions relating to the social and political definition of the information society. The emphasis here will lie not on technological flights of fancy, but on the fronts drawn up in a society that is in a process of fundamental and violent upheaval. see also: http://web.aec.at/infowar/eng.html"}, {"response": 5, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Thu, May  6, 1999 (13:27)", "body": "The NetAid event of Belgrad radio B92 is something of a David-vs-Goliath uphill-struggle on the Web. There's a great lineup of artists supporting them (Sonic Youth, Mike Watts, etc.). Read more in the B92 topic: http://www.spring.net/yapp-bin/restricted/read/radio/28 ."}, {"response": 6, "author": "terry", "date": "Thu, Jul  5, 2001 (10:42)", "body": "Cybermania Takes Iran by Surprise Youths Swarm Online; Tehran Scrambles to Respond By Molly Moore Washington Post Foreign Service Wednesday, July 4, 2001; 12:00 AM TEHRAN \ufffd Arash Fahimi is a teenager in a nation that frowns on dating, outlaws rock music and offers a 17-year-old almost no chance for travel beyond its borders. But Fahimi, like hundreds of thousands of young Iranians, has discovered an escape from his cultural cocoon. Sitting at a computer terminal in an Internet cafe, he downloads the latest Western pop music hits and chats daily with cyber-acquaintances around the globe. He even found a girlfriend on the Internet. \"I want to have a better idea of what the world is like,\" said Fahimi, earphones clamped under a Nike baseball cap and fingers tapping out a chat room response on his screen. \"If I can't make a trip abroad, the Internet is the best way.\" In the Islamic Republic of Iran, where public behavior is stringently regulated and citizens fear arrest for speaking their minds, the Internet is transforming personal lifestyles and liberating public expression at a pace that a technologically handicapped bureaucracy has been unable to control. Although Iran lags behind much of the world in Internet use \ufffd service became widely available only about 18 months ago \ufffd it is now escalating so rapidly that the government has been caught off guard. Officials are drafting rules and preparing software and equipment for controlling Internet access and service, but authorities say it is unclear whether restrictions will be implemented, and if they are, how effective they would be. For now, chat rooms have become the new, uncensored recreation centers for young people with few places to socialize or express political views. Web sites offer a link for gays and lesbians to meet in a culture where homosexuality remains taboo. They provide a forum for dissenting opinions in a country where the conservative-controlled judiciary has shut down nearly 40 reformist newspapers and magazines in the past year. They can be a conduit for sending flowers to mom or making software-related U.S. business deals despite U.S. sanctions. Internet cafes, or \"coffeenets\" in Iranian parlance, are opening in Tehran at the rate of about one a day, with an estimated 450 now operating, according to government and business estimates. Some private Internet service providers claim the number of new subscribers each month is more than triple the number of just over a year ago. \"One-and-one-half years ago there were two Internet cafes in Tehran,\" said Madjid Emami, 30, a graduate of the University of California at Berkeley who returned to his homeland seven years ago and recently started Pars Online, a private Internet service provider, with a group of friends. \"Now there's an Internet cafe on every corner. Even tea shops are putting computers in.\" Government and private service providers estimate that 350,000 to 1 million Iranians use the Internet \ufffd mostly through universities, government agencies and Internet cafes \ufffd up from 2,000 users five years ago. The cafes charge about $2 for an hour online. Rather than lash out at the potential evils of the Internet, many of the country's highest-ranking clerics have created their own Web sites \ufffd as the supreme religious leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has said \ufffd to \"answer religious questions, to introduce the jurisprudential decrees of Imam Khomeini (may Allah's blessings be upon him)\" and to offer their own interpretation of Islam. But government authorities are raising concerns over the uses of the Internet and debating what to do about them. \"The state is concerned with the security problems the Internet might bring. Anyone can put what they want on a site without being tracked,\" said Shahram Sharif, 29, a reporter who covers computer issues for the daily newspaper Hambastegi. \"One day the Internet will conflict with the interests of the state. They are going to have to decide whether it will be filtered or whether they'll leave it free. Now, it's all open to question.\" Several weeks ago, police shut down nearly all Internet cafes in Tehran, claiming they lacked operating licenses. Owners discovered the government had placed a notice in a little-read newspaper several months earlier warning them to obtain permits. All but a handful of the cafes have since been licensed and reopened, officials said. \"It's the negative points of the Internet we have to fight, not the Internet itself,\" said Ahmad Motamedi, who heads the Ministry of Post, Telegraph and Telephone, which has the most potential authority over computer access and control. \" continued at http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A15729-2001Jul3.html"}, {"response": 7, "author": "terry", "date": "Fri, Jun 28, 2002 (12:07)", "body": "Kit Fit for the Future Shines at Paris Arms Fair Mon Jun 17, 2:41 PM ET By Estelle Shirbon VILLEPINTE, France (Reuters) - Forget binoculars. Now you can carry your own solar-powered spy plane in a backpack and send it flying over nearby hills while it beams video images back to you. The drone, about three feet long and equipped with both regular and infrared cameras for day and night vision, is on display at the Eurosatory arms fair near Paris, where some 800 exhibitors are showing the latest in defense equipment. \"I call it the foot-soldier's third eye,\" said Michel Haigrou, an engineer at French company Tecknisolar-Seni and one of the remote-controlled mini spy plane's inventors. The plane is designed to let soldiers in hostile territory see what is happening around them, he said. It can be assembled in less than three minutes and fly a distance of just over half a mile from the person controlling it. more @ http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=585&ncid=753&e=8&u=/nm/20020617/sc_nm/france_inventions_dc_1 internet conference Main Menu"}]}, {"num": 23, "subject": "Paul [Does Anyone know how to use ws finger?]", "response_count": 0, "posts": []}, {"num": 24, "subject": "agents on the net", "response_count": 1, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "terry", "date": "Thu, Jul 23, 1998 (15:00)", "body": "From tbyfield@panix.com Mon Jul 6 16:36:11 1998 Date: Mon, 6 Jul 1998 12:55:08 -0500 To: nettime-l@Desk.nl From: ted byfield Subject: a lot of little short busts :| Sender: owner-nettime-l@basis.Desk.nl Precedence: bulk X-UIDL: 26d3af6ac45665312401c88a14724693 [So if high-tech capitalism systemically tends to become a low-returns business, what about alternative models, for example high-tech reform- ist socialism? anyway. forwarded with permission.-T] Wired for mayhem By Mark Ward Economic booms and busts will become more frequent and more severe if programs called software agents control electronic commerce. Agents tend to exaggerate the worst market swings and create disastrous price wars, say two research groups in the US. As more goods and services are bought on the Internet, observers predict that we will need agents to get the best prices. But agents are not subject to the restraints that normally slow economic activity: their transactions take place almost instantaneously, cost next to nothing and distance is irrelevant. Jeffrey Kephart and colleagues at IBM's Thomas J. Watson Research Center in New York have been studying a simple market that uses agents to buy and sell information like stock prices. They created a model with three types of agents: one published the information, another acted as a broker that split the data into saleable chunks, and the third represented consumers. The model used 10 information providers, 10 brokers and 1000 customers. Yet even in this simple model, Kephart found that the swift reactions of broker and consumer agents to price changes meant that devastating price wars raged constantly, and providers' profits varied wildly as they fought for business. Customers were often dropped by brokers when it became unprofitable to supply them with information. Alexander Chislenko of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology built another model--and got very similar results. He says that controlling economies with heavy use of agents \"would be like trying to control a car that was travelling at 500 miles an hour\" because agent economies exhibit behaviour that verges on the chaotic. ) Copyright New Scientist, RBI Limited 1998 --- # distributed via nettime-l : no commercial use without permission # is a closed moderated mailinglist for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: majordomo@desk.nl and \"info nettime-l\" in the msg body # URL: http://www.desk.nl/~nettime/ contact: nettime-owner@desk.nl internet conference Main Menu"}]}, {"num": 25, "subject": "hackers (Hacker Crackdown by Bruce Sterling)", "response_count": 53, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "terry", "date": "Mon, Jul 27, 1998 (10:52)", "body": "Bruce Sterling bruces@well.sf.ca.us Literary Freeware -- Not for Commercial Use Speech to High Technology Crime Investigation Association Lake Tahoe, Nov 1994 Good morning, my name's Bruce Sterling, and I'm a sometime computer crime journalist and longtime science fiction writer from Austin Texas. I'm the guy who wrote HACKER CRACKDOWN, which is the book you're getting on one of those floppy disks that are being distributed at this gig like party favors. People in law enforcement often ask me, Mr Sterling, if you're a science fiction writer like you say you are, then why should you care about American computer police and private security? And also, how come my kids can never find any copies of your sci-fi novels? Well, my publishers do their best. The truth of the matter is that I've survived my brief career as a computer-crime journalist. I'm now back to writing science fiction full time, like I want to do and like I ought to do. I really can't help the rest of it. It's true that HACKER CRACKDOWN is still available on the stands at your friendly local bookstore -- maybe a better chance if it's a computer bookstore. In fact it's in its second paperback printing, which is considered pretty good news in my business. The critics have been very kind about that book. But even though I'm sure I could write another book like HACKER CRACKDOWN every year for the rest of my life, I'm just not gonna do that. Instead, let me show you some items out of this bag. This is HACKER CRACKDOWN, the paperback. And see, this is a book of my short stories that has come out since I published HACKER CRACKDOWN! And here's a brand new hardback novel of mine which came out just last month! Hard physical evidence of my career as a fiction writer! I know these wacko cyberpunk sci-fi books are of basically zero relevance to you guys, but I'm absurdly proud of them, so I just had to show them off. So why did I write HACKER CRACKDOWN in the first place? Well, I figured that somebody ought to do it, and nobody else was willing, that's why. When I first got interested in Operation Sundevil and the Legion of Doom and the raid on Steve Jackson Games and so forth, it was 1990. All these issues were very obscure. It was the middle of the Bush Administration. There was no information superhighway vice president. There was no WIRED magazine. There was no Electronic Frontier Foundation. There was no Clipper Chip and no Digital Telephony Initiative. There was no PGP and no World Wide Web. There were a few books around, and a couple of movies, that glamorized computer crackers, but there had never been a popular book written about American computer cops. When I got started researching HACKER CRACKDOWN, my first and only nonfiction book, I didn't even think I was going to write any such book. There were four other journalists hot on the case who were all rather better qualified than I was. But one by one they all dropped out. Eventually I realized that either I was going to write it, or nobody was ever going to tell the story. All those strange events and peculiar happenings would have passed, and left no public record. I couldn't help but feel that if I didn't take the trouble and effort to tell people what had happened, it would probably all have to happen all over again. And again and again, until people finally noticed it and were willing to talk about it publicly. Nowadays it's very different. There are about a million journalists with Internet addresses now. There are other books around, like for instance Hafner and Markoff's CYBERPUNK OUTLAWS AND HACKERS, which is a far better book about hackers than my book is. Mungo and Clough's book APPROACHING ZERO has a pretty interesting take on the European virus scene. Joshua Quittner has a book coming out on the Masters of Deception hacking group. Then there's this other very recent book I have here, CYBERSPACE AND THE LAW by Cavazos and Morin, which is a pretty good practical handbook on digital civil liberties issues. This book explains in pretty good legal detail exactly what kind of stunts with your modem are likely to get you into trouble. This is a useful service for keeping people out of hot water, which is pretty much what my book was intended to do, only this book does it better. And there have been a lot of magazine and newspaper articles published. Basically, I'm no longer needed as a computer crime journalist. The world is full of computer journalists now, and the stuff I was writing about four years ago, is hot and sexy and popular now. That's why I don't have to write it any more. I was ahead of my time. I'm supposed to be ahead of my time. I'm a science fiction writer. Believe it or not, I'm needed to write science fiction. Taking a science fiction writer and turning him into a journalist is like stealing pencils from a blind man's cup. So frankly, I haven't been keeping up with you guys, and your odd and unusual world, with the same gusto I did in 90 and 91. Nowadays, I spend all my tim"}, {"response": 2, "author": "terry", "date": "Mon, Jul 27, 1998 (11:04)", "body": "That was 1993, I wonder what we're up to now? There is way too much mutual demonization, we need to be a more caring society, all the way from the Special Prosecutors office adn the BOP down."}, {"response": 3, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Mon, Jul 27, 1998 (23:09)", "body": "damned good question...think you can talk Bruce into popping in once a month with his current thoughts, or for a brief q and a session? think it'd help if I offered to bribe him with Italian food?"}, {"response": 4, "author": "terry", "date": "Tue, Jul 28, 1998 (08:59)", "body": "That might help, email him at bruces@well.com with a bribe of Italian food!"}, {"response": 5, "author": "autumn", "date": "Tue, Jul 28, 1998 (08:59)", "body": "My head is swimming! I had no knowledge of a \"computer police.\""}, {"response": 6, "author": "terry", "date": "Wed, Jul 29, 1998 (08:47)", "body": "Bruce, by the way, is the audio on our main spring page these days. He's talking about \"dead media\"."}, {"response": 7, "author": "terry", "date": "Mon, Feb  8, 1999 (20:32)", "body": "From: Adam Penenberg Feb. 8, 1999 Open letter to the hacking community: Last week, Steve Silberman of Wired News called to tell me he and I and some other journalists had been duped by a psuedo-hacker named Christian Valor, AKA se7en. In April 1998, I\"d posted a piece on the Forbes Digital Tool web site about Valor\"s kiddie porn vigilantism and the fact that law enforcement knew what he was doing, but turned a blind eye. Cool story. Too bad it turned out not to be true. I was certainly in good company. Steve also had written about Valor\"s exploits, as had Newsday, the Independent in London, etc. Both Steve and I received letters from se7en's ex-girlfriend simultaneously last week, but Steve got on to the story first. I was out of town. Sad to say, he and I were the only ones to respond to her letter. I told Steve I wouldn't post anything until his story hit. (See \"Kid-Porn Vigilante Hacked Media http://www.wired.com/news/news/culture/story/17775.html). I can't comment on how the Steve or the Independent or Newsday conducted their research, but I would like to share with all of you how I did mine, and what went wrong. I\"m sure there are lessons to be learned. As you may or may not know, I am no stranger to taking on journalists I think have concocted stories out of thin air. I broke the Stephen Glass story, the associate editor of The New Republic who made up a story on hackers and was later discovered to have made up some three dozen stories for a number of well-known publications (See \"Lies, damn lies and fiction\": http://www.forbes.com/tool/html/98/may/0511/otw3.htm). I also took on Beth Piskora of The New York Post, who I believe made up a sexy tech story on Organized Crime setting up phony companies for Y2K remediation, who then, she claims, inserted software to divert money from bank accounts (read: clients) to mob-controlled accounts. (See \"Phantom mobsters\": http://www.forbes.com/tool/html/98/aug/0828/feat.htm). This canard was picked up by Vanity Fair in a recent feature on Y2K. Vanity Fair has yet to admit it published a lie. I hate it when you nail a journalist and instead of coming clean, he or she hides. This is what both Glass and Piskora have done. That's why I\"m writing this note. For my story (Kiddie porn vigilante: http://www.forbes.com/tool/html/98/apr/0417/feat.htm) I knew I couldn\"t get on IRC and traffic in kiddie porn on a Forbes computer. You remember what happened to that journalist for NPR who did, and is now had to plead guilty to a felony all because he was ostensibly researching a story? So I relied on law enforcement, EHAP, and NAMBLA. I called literally 10 law enforcement officials who said they studied under Valor in one of his security courses. On the record, they would all vouch for se7en\"s hacking skills. Off the record, they all said they knew what he was doing but they didn't care. Everyone hates kiddie porn traffickers. I also talked to EHAP, and they told me they were distressed by se7en\"s actions, because it gave hackers a bad name. Se7en should turn them over to the cops or the ISPs, they said, not break the law in going after them. They didn\"t say he was a fraud. I also contacted NAMBLA through its web site. I asked if anyone knew a hacker named se7en, who was purportedly going after kiddie porn traffickers on IRC. I received a cryptic response, something along the lines of, \"Yes, some of our members have been complaining about this guy. We just want to be left alone.\" End of conversation. He refused to turn over any other details. So I felt confident that with all this cross-checking that Valor was who he said he was. Obviously, I made a mistake. I think the most important lesson I learned is that law enforcement doesn\"t have a clue what really goes on in hacking circles; they are not good sources for this. I also now won\"t write a hacking story unless I can meet the hacker face-to-face and actually see evidence that I can then verify with other hackers/or computer security experts I trust. This is how I approached my story for Forbes magazine on the NY Times hack that ran last fall (available online at: (http://www.forbes.com/forbes/98/1116/6211132a.htm). If you want to send me taunting email, telling me what a fool I was, feel free. I\"m at apenenberg@forbes.com. But you can\"t possibly be harder on me than I\"ve been on myself this past week. You live, you learn. Sincerely, Adam Penenberg Senior Editor, Forbes Magazine"}, {"response": 8, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Thu, Feb 11, 1999 (17:56)", "body": "excellent piece"}, {"response": 9, "author": "terry", "date": "Fri, Feb 12, 1999 (14:26)", "body": "That was good."}, {"response": 10, "author": "terry", "date": "Mon, Mar  8, 1999 (14:07)", "body": "Bruce's party: PARTY INVITATION. In totally informal conjunction with the annual South By SouthWest Multimedia Festival, my wife Nancy and I are throwing another Open House Party on the evening of March 16th, Tuesday, starting, say, 7:30 pm or so. If you're in Dead Media Project, please consider this your formal invitation to attend. Bring anybody you trust. There will be cold beer. And (even more astonishing and provocative) there will be cigarettes. If you've never been to my house before (once memorably described by TIME magazine as \"the leafy tranquillity of Sterling's well-appointed Austin, Texas home\"), send email and I'll ship you the directions and a phone number. Mind you, the SXSW Multimedia Party we threw last time was not half shabby. These digital-arts people are definitely a self-starting crowd. No Charades or Twister was required to break the ice. Quite a good time was had by all."}, {"response": 11, "author": "terry", "date": "Thu, Jul  1, 1999 (12:23)", "body": "There's a good article about writers lairs today in XL, where they describe their environments, their habits and distractions. Anyone who's been to a Bruce Sterling fete has probably meandered down the hall to his home office and Bruce is one of the interviewees. Along with novelist Sarah Bird, Robert Draper, Milly Ivins, screenwriter Bill Witliff (Lonesome Dove), and playwright Jo Carol Pierce. I like Bruces quote on Austin clothing style \"it's not just that people here dress like slobs, they dress aggressively like slobs\" in response to the query on \"inspirational clothing.\" Bill Witliff writes in O'Henry's old house. (reference July 1 99 XLent)"}, {"response": 12, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Thu, Jul  1, 1999 (12:53)", "body": "Terry, have you read Bruce's last book, Distraction ? He got off on the dress subject there big time... So, do Austinites have a bad sense of dressing?"}, {"response": 13, "author": "terry", "date": "Thu, Jul  1, 1999 (13:05)", "body": "I dress for total comfort, every day, even when I'm consulting at IBM. Bruce is right. Austin is a total slacker dress environment. Lately, I've been wearing either jeans and a free t shirt (one of many of gotten at computer trade shows) or Columbia pants and shirts (Columbia clothes are for total comfort, the pants are these zip apart convert-to-swim trunks lightweight material and the shirts make you look like you're either a photographer or on an expedition."}, {"response": 14, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Thu, Jul  1, 1999 (13:30)", "body": "Ho! The adventurous look!"}, {"response": 15, "author": "terry", "date": "Thu, Jul  1, 1999 (16:45)", "body": "Yep, more the comfort look. I wear the most comfortable clothes I can find. There are no dress codes at places of work in Austin, just about anything goes. The only place I go that has a dress code is the Sports Club (no tank tops or skin tight shorts, which I don't wear anyway)."}, {"response": 16, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Mon, Jul  5, 1999 (05:29)", "body": "No shirt No shoes No Dice ?"}, {"response": 17, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Tue, Jul  6, 1999 (00:25)", "body": "You talkin' to me? (or is that just a friendly proposition?)"}, {"response": 18, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Thu, Jul  8, 1999 (06:22)", "body": "So, you a sloppy (err, sorry, mark that: comfortable) dresser, too?"}, {"response": 19, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Fri, Jul  9, 1999 (02:52)", "body": "most of the time...depends on the occasion...when I temped at the State, I wore a tie every day..."}, {"response": 20, "author": "stacey", "date": "Fri, Jul  9, 1999 (11:17)", "body": "woo woo! i wanna see that!"}, {"response": 21, "author": "terry", "date": "Fri, Jul  9, 1999 (12:06)", "body": "I can't remember the last time I wore a tie."}, {"response": 22, "author": "stacey", "date": "Fri, Jul  9, 1999 (13:47)", "body": "probably somewhere between bee pollen gathering and MagRabbiteering..."}, {"response": 23, "author": "terry", "date": "Sun, Jul 11, 1999 (03:27)", "body": "I used to wear a tie at BPI, back in 1985."}, {"response": 24, "author": "casanova", "date": "Sun, Jul 11, 1999 (10:01)", "body": "is that a choice to shose betwwen a tie and t_shirt"}, {"response": 25, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Sun, Jul 11, 1999 (10:27)", "body": "good question! Good morning, Casanova, how are you today?"}, {"response": 26, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Oct 29, 1999 (17:19)", "body": "I devoutly hope there is an especially nasty place in the afterlife for those who hack into private information and use it as a threat to ruin lives. I have twice been the victim of this reprehensible activity and I would happily watch some malicious endeavor enacted on those who requested it and for those who did it. My deepest loathing is reserved for them. I am happy you are comfortable in Austin...we dress like that out here, as well. However, I will do just about anything for a man considerate enough to wear a tie for me. There have been none in my life in the last 20 years...perhaps I am not worth the effort..."}, {"response": 27, "author": "Irishprincess", "date": "Fri, Oct 29, 1999 (17:56)", "body": "Hear, hear! That's as tasteless and outright wrong as snooping through someone's personal effects. I'm sure computer hackers are the same people who come to your house, go to the bathroom, and look through your medicine cabinet, helping themselves to whatever they think they might need!"}, {"response": 28, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Oct 29, 1999 (18:47)", "body": "...or whatever they can hold you hostage to return while keeping just enough for them selves that you are never free of the scumbags (the most polite term I can think of at the moment). Thanks, Amy!"}, {"response": 29, "author": "terry", "date": "Fri, Oct 29, 1999 (19:54)", "body": "I just think men are getting away from constrictive ties and we're moving to a more casual dress code. It may not be disrespect or lack of attentiveness to you. Not having to wear a tie to work is becoming a sign of indendence and freedom, especially in the high tech startups. And I can also see where if it made you happy that a guy with you would want to wear a tie just to make you feel good. If that's what does it for you!"}, {"response": 30, "author": "Irishprincess", "date": "Fri, Oct 29, 1999 (20:06)", "body": "I like ties on men, as long as they're not too short or have gravy dribbled down the front! I know I prefer myself dressed up, and so I also prefer men dressed up. Rebelling against my redneck, \"wearing a shirt without holes in it is dressed up\" childhood, I guess!"}, {"response": 31, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Oct 29, 1999 (20:53)", "body": "Terry, is it really too much to expect when I am attired in the best I have to wear as he wishes to show me off as his jewel, that he dress accordingly? No matter whether it is to a symphony concert or an academic reception - he dresses the same - aloha shirt, which is appropriate for just about anything BUT a formal setting. Just once in a while...maybe even just once a year...but some time in the 15+ years he has been around!"}, {"response": 32, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Oct 29, 1999 (20:54)", "body": "...and, yes! That REALLY does it for me...!"}, {"response": 33, "author": "Irishprincess", "date": "Fri, Oct 29, 1999 (20:58)", "body": "Ah, some men are hopeless--my dad didn't even wear a tie to my college graduation!"}, {"response": 34, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Oct 29, 1999 (21:11)", "body": "Well, someone suggested I bury him in one. Heck no! If he won't put it on, I sure am not going to do it for him. What good is it anyway when he is dead?!"}, {"response": 35, "author": "Irishprincess", "date": "Fri, Oct 29, 1999 (21:33)", "body": "He'd probably come back and haunt you if you did! *giggle*"}, {"response": 36, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Oct 29, 1999 (23:29)", "body": "Probably...just to be irritating...! *lol*"}, {"response": 37, "author": "terry", "date": "Sat, Oct 30, 1999 (04:31)", "body": "Oh sure, if you get that dudded up he should wear a tie. Ties are really going away as work attire. It would probably put you at a disadvantage to show up for an interview with a tech company in Austin wearing a tie."}, {"response": 38, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Sat, Oct 30, 1999 (12:12)", "body": "I understand that. Same with geology jobs in California. A neat sports shirt and tailored slacks is fine unless they are meeting in the field, in which case it is hiking boots, jeans and appropriate shirt. I even like turtleneck and sports jacket for evening, but...maybe in another life time I'll get one who understands what is appropriate dress for special occasions."}, {"response": 39, "author": "Isabel", "date": "Mon, Nov  1, 1999 (09:10)", "body": "Maybe you should tell him that he looks more distinguished, impressive or authoritarian in a tuxedo - this may help if he loves pedestals so much as you mentioned before...( or that it makes him look ten years younger and is impressing the girls \ufffdgrin\ufffd)"}, {"response": 40, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Mon, Nov  1, 1999 (11:12)", "body": "(hehe)"}, {"response": 41, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Mon, Nov  1, 1999 (13:19)", "body": "Tuxedos? You gotta be kidding...though his vanity might be nudged by the idea of enticing girls with a tie. Perhaps his tielessness is just another mark against him as I weigh the pros and cons of his continued existance in my world. Pathetically, the man is clueless even when I draw him a picture - he just tells me to go take something and to calm down. I will die of pill poisioning soon!"}, {"response": 42, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Mon, Nov  1, 1999 (13:20)", "body": "However, the next guy I see who is wearing one, I am ripping open my bodice and letting him have his way with me... (sounds good but I could never go through with it..)"}, {"response": 43, "author": "Irishprincess", "date": "Mon, Nov  1, 1999 (16:07)", "body": "*snicker*"}, {"response": 44, "author": "Isabel", "date": "Tue, Nov  2, 1999 (10:07)", "body": "Why not? :-D"}, {"response": 45, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Tue, Nov  2, 1999 (10:54)", "body": "...'cause I am basically chicken... but it does sound like such a good idea. They are very few and far between out here in the humidity and heat. Perhaps I should just settle for academic regalia...with the tie and dress shirt beneath, but I did that once, and clothes did NOT make the man...and if it were not for hackers I just might know what ones looks like who is especially choice anyway by now."}, {"response": 46, "author": "Irishprincess", "date": "Tue, Nov  2, 1999 (12:45)", "body": "Hmm...I wonder... Who is Bruce Sterling, anyhow? It reminds me of Remington Steele."}, {"response": 47, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Tue, Nov  2, 1999 (13:04)", "body": "Beats me - Bruce Willis-Rod Serling cross? Terry will know, though! (If you read the intro to this topic (up there before the first post) it will tell you more about this man."}, {"response": 48, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Tue, Nov  2, 1999 (14:40)", "body": "Bruce Sterling, journalist and established novelist, Austin. Two kids, married. Will found ecological movement \"Viridianism\" on Jan 3rd 2000. See topic on Viridianism in Environment conf, and the Dead Media topic - another pet subject of his - in Media. Best known as co-founder of the cyberpunk-genre in Sci-Fi (along with William Gibson and others), he wrote his Hacker Crackdown after Austin's Steve Jackson Games have been raided by justice forces. This book describes all that lead to the raid, the whole hacker-scenes, certain cases. The important part is, the book was very early (1991 or 92), and showed the side of the hackers, telcos, police and federal agents. Entirely non-fictional, and good to read."}, {"response": 49, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Nov  5, 1999 (15:09)", "body": "If there were any lawsuits involved perhaps I can take notes. I am going to personally emasculate the guy who has caused me so much grief in this area and hit him where he thinks he lives...(anger and indignation unabated and not forgiven nor forgotten!)"}, {"response": 50, "author": "Irishprincess", "date": "Fri, Nov  5, 1999 (16:35)", "body": "Go get 'em, Marcia!"}, {"response": 51, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Nov  5, 1999 (17:23)", "body": "...froth...froth...! Hope they do not have rabies injections. I need all of this anger to work for me when I kick the miserable man out of my life!"}, {"response": 52, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Nov  5, 1999 (17:25)", "body": "I am a nice lady, actually...but I have been pushed too far for too long, and this time the enormous rug rat in the other room has overstepped his bounds."}, {"response": 53, "author": "Irishprincess", "date": "Fri, Nov  5, 1999 (18:33)", "body": "Kick him to the curb! (Just kidding--I was pretending I was on a talk show.) internet conference Main Menu"}]}, {"num": 26, "subject": "New Thinking: If", "response_count": 5, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "terry", "date": "Wed, Jul 29, 1998 (08:48)", "body": "What makes sense is to start building search engines that look at links creatively, and find out where sites link to the most, this is where the best information lies."}, {"response": 2, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Wed, Jul 29, 1998 (16:17)", "body": "maybe they should start that way, but then learn and adapt to each user..."}, {"response": 3, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Oct 29, 1999 (18:29)", "body": "Personalize them...but since that was written and since I first came into Windows Lycos has gone from first to worst, and Altavista still gets my vote as the most versatile search engine of them all. It would be lovely to have a super-search engine which would pull data (not just the top 10 from several as happens now on metacrawler and such) from them all and let us pick and choose the material we consider relevant. Is that asking too much...I guess it might be..."}, {"response": 4, "author": "terry", "date": "Fri, Oct 29, 1999 (19:55)", "body": "Google gets high marks for relevance. As does infind."}, {"response": 5, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Oct 29, 1999 (21:09)", "body": "Never heard on infind. Google is super but not for everything - it is particularly weak on science things for which I have done searches - items for Geo, for instance. internet conference Main Menu"}]}, {"num": 27, "subject": "MAIN - Metropolitan Austin Information Network", "response_count": 8, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "legaffe", "date": "Sat, Oct 18, 1997 (11:58)", "body": "Is the Spring linked from MAIN's site?"}, {"response": 2, "author": "terry", "date": "Sat, Oct 18, 1997 (12:28)", "body": "Not yet, I'm working on it. I've called Sue and Gene but no results as of yet."}, {"response": 3, "author": "legaffe", "date": "Sat, Nov  8, 1997 (17:48)", "body": "What's the matter with those folks?"}, {"response": 4, "author": "terry", "date": "Sat, Nov  8, 1997 (18:43)", "body": "I'll check the site and see if they've done anything."}, {"response": 5, "author": "terry", "date": "Sat, Jan  3, 1998 (09:22)", "body": "There's another organization getting kids into computers called Questlink. The Silicon Hills Charity Ball on New Years Eve raised money for this to the tune of about $3500. Karen Zelina's goal is to wire up 125 computers for kids in the foreseeable future. Call 322-3220 or mailto://jwitt@questlink.com"}, {"response": 6, "author": "terry", "date": "Thu, Aug 20, 1998 (06:07)", "body": "from: Arthur R. McGee (amcgee) \"Race, Class, and the Internet\" [I don't agree with all the conclusions, but these are very interesting and important studies/reports. Please be sure to at least browse them] [By the way, these are mostly original material, not the summarized stuff that people have been reading in newspapers and magazines] Bridging the Digital Divide: The Impact of Race on Computer Access and Internet Use http://www2000.ogsm.vanderbilt.edu/papers/race/science.html High Technology and Low-Income Communities: Prospects for the Positive Use of Advanced Information Technology http://web.mit.edu/sap/www/high-low/ What Color is the Net? http://www.hotwired.com/netizen/97/11/index2a.html Losing Ground Bit by Bit: Low-Income Communities in the Information Age http://www.benton.org/Library/Low-Income/ Falling Through the Net II: New Data on the Digital Divide http://www.ntia.doc.gov/ntiahome/net2/ Impact of CTCnet Affiliates: Findings from a National Survey of Users of Community Technology Centers http://www.ctcnet.org/impact98.htm ------------------------------------------------------------------ | Arthur McGee (Staff) | | Institute for Global Communications http://www.igc.org/ | | Voice: +1-310-515-BYTE Fax: +1-415-561-6101 | | PeaceNet * EcoNet * ConflictNet * WomensNet * LaborNet | ------------------------------------------------------------------ | \"Connecting the People Who Are Changing the World\" | ------------------------------------------------------------------"}, {"response": 7, "author": "sprin5", "date": "Thu, Nov 30, 2000 (13:56)", "body": "COMMUNITY NETWORK CONFERENCE December 11-12, 2000 (CTC; NTIA workshops - Dec. 10) Omni Southpark, Austin, Texas You are invited to the 3rd Annual Community Network Conference at the Omni Southpark Hotel in Austin, Texas. This is the year's key gathering for everyone interested in using telecommunications technology for community development. The agenda includes the latest information on community network programs and resources, as well as details of grants coming from the US Department of Commerce, Department of Education, Texas Telecommunications Infrastructure Fund and others. Workshops for community leaders offer expert advice for success and survival of community network technology projects. Pre-conference events begin Sunday afternoon, December 10 Conference presentations are Monday and Tuesday, December 11 and 12. Sunday, December 10 - Pre-conference events: (10:30) - Community Technology Center workshop. National CTC.net organization gives a complete overview of creating and sustaining successful community tech centers. (1-5pm) - NTIA national workshop on Technology Opportunities Program (TOP) grants coming in January. TOP program officers will describe 2001 program and give interactive guidance on successfully applying for an expected $45 million in grants. (5:30-7:30 pm) - \"Cybercity Social\" reception. The Metropolitan Austin Interactive Network www.main.org and the City of Austin Office of Telecommunications and Regulatory Affairs invites you to meet friends and colleagues at the annual Cybercity Social gathering. Monday and Tuesday, December 11-12 - General Conference Program: Details and preliminary agenda are online at http://www.tcrc.net/conference . This Community Network Conference emphasizes practicality as well as possibilities, discussing today's real telecom choices for community social and economic development. . We feel this year's program will be the most valuable and complete offering of community network technology information we have ever presented. Examples include Association for Community Networking \"CN success\" program tracks, Community Technology workshops from CTC Net, and extensive Rural Connectivity content, combined with announcements and assistance for CN tools, grants and resources. We look forward to seeing you in December. Gene Crick TeleCommunity Resource Center http:/www.tcrc.net/conference gcrick@main.org 512/919-7590 fax 919-7591"}, {"response": 8, "author": "sprin5", "date": "Fri, Dec  1, 2000 (07:03)", "body": "Gene's my neighbor in Cedar Creek and I look forward to getting yet more t shirts at the Cybersocial. internet conference Main Menu"}]}, {"num": 28, "subject": "Communications Clients", "response_count": 27, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "terryd", "date": "Sat, Oct 26, 1996 (14:50)", "body": "Hi Terry, I just wanted to reccomend that CWSA do a review of IRISphone. I don't work for them but I like the product. Check it out. T.D."}, {"response": 2, "author": "terry", "date": "Sun, Oct 27, 1996 (12:18)", "body": "What's their website? And what do you know about it?"}, {"response": 3, "author": "terryd", "date": "Sun, Oct 27, 1996 (14:35)", "body": "www.irisphone.com I've been using the demo for a couple of weeks now and it has as good a sound quality as the other phones I've tried and a voice mail feature that is fairly dependable. U get photos. with the phone book listings, and they only want $19.95 to register it. It's pretty easy to use also."}, {"response": 4, "author": "terry", "date": "Sun, Oct 27, 1996 (15:55)", "body": "Thanks, I'll check out their website."}, {"response": 5, "author": "terry", "date": "Sun, Jan 25, 1998 (19:13)", "body": "Important news for all users of communications clients: Date: Sun, 25 Jan 1998 12:41:06 -0500 (EST) From: Jeff Pulver To: Free-World-Dialup Subject: [Free World Dialup]: Internet Telephony SHOULD NOT Be Regulated Sender: owner-free-world-dialup@Pulver.COM >From the January 22, 1998 issue of: The Pulver Report -------------------------------------------------------- Internet Telephony Should not be Regulated - The EU made the right Decision. The European Union recently announced that they felt that Internet Telephony should not be regulated. This is good news. However due to the continued hype and hysteria by some in the media about the potential harm to certain PTTs - Internet Telephony has become illegal in countries like India and something should be done about this. On the open Internet - the majority of Internet Telephony use remains in the hands of hobbyists. These users pose no threat to anybody and should continue to be allowed to use PC to PC telephony. If there are some people operating Telecom businesses where they are terminating with data circuits instead of voice circuits just to avoid paying the access charges in a certain country - one word of advice - make as much money as you can now - since this loophole will be closed in the near future. I first heard about India attempting to regulate the IP Voice market a few months ago when the Indian marketplace was deregulated. These days ISPs in India do not have the ability to connect PSTN/IP Gateways. Friends of mine have reported that actual PC based Internet Telephony usage in India is also illegal. This I feel is a decision that was made in part by somebody in the Indian Government who clearly did not know about all of the issues and technologies surrounding IP Voice. In 1996 when I founded the Voice on the Net Coalition we were able to find a common ground to work with both ACTA and the FCC. While the ACTA Petition has yet to be acted upon, there are now open lines of communication between all parties and I hope that with continued pressure nobody in Washington, D.C. will be making UNinformed decisions. The same can not be said about the possibilities of International Regulation of Internet Telephony. Now is the time for the VON Coalition to go Global. If there are companies which have a vested interest in this space who can make a commitment to help establish open dialogs with Government Agencies around the world please let me know. I'm willing to spend some of my time meeting with other Government Agencies - but we need to be able to scale. Now is NOT the time for the industry to sit idle - doing so will threaten the future use for the International Internet Community to use IP Voice products. Best Regards, ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Jeff Pulver Tel. 516.753.2640 Publisher Fax. 516.293.3996 The Pulver Report http://pulver.com Conference: Video on the Net '98 http://pulver.com/video98 Conference: Spring '98 Voice on the Net http://pulver.com/von98"}, {"response": 6, "author": "terry", "date": "Fri, Aug 21, 1998 (11:47)", "body": "Here are, in general, the best apps for communicating over the net (not just videoconferencing in some cases) in order of effectiveness and overall quality: Iphone 5.01 ftp://ftp.vocaltec.com/pub/iphone/iphone50.exe WebPhone ftp://ftp.netspeak.com/pub/wpsetup.exe VDOPhone ftp://ftp.vdo.net/vdptrial.exe NetMeeting http://mssjus3.www.conxion.com/msdownload/netmeeting/Nm21.exe OnLive! Traveler http://www.onlive.com/cgi-bin/travreg.cgi PowWow32 ftp://ftp.powwow.com/powwow36.exe PhoneFerret ftp://ferret.aitcom.net/pub/ferret/PFT111.exe Virtual Places http://download.vplaces.com/clients/VP32r21.exe Active Worlds http://aw.mpl.net/downloads/awb.exe Speak Freely http://www.fourmilab.ch/speakfree/windows/speakfb.zip WinTalk ftp://ftp.elf.com/pub/wintalk/wtalk127.zip VoxPhone ftp://papa.indstate.edu/winsock-l/Windows95/tx32v20.exe"}, {"response": 7, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Sat, Aug 28, 1999 (14:38)", "body": "My son and I communicate with WebPhone, and I recommend it highly. It also has the feature of a notepad if you are having trouble on one end which the other end is not aware of...pop up your note pad and tell them you are having a mic problem or you cannot hear them...whatever."}, {"response": 8, "author": "terry", "date": "Thu, Sep  2, 1999 (09:05)", "body": "Have you tried any other of these communication apps?"}, {"response": 9, "author": "terry", "date": "Thu, Sep  2, 1999 (10:44)", "body": "Like, for example, NetMeeting. That's what I'm trying to get my sister to use."}, {"response": 10, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Mon, Sep  6, 1999 (20:37)", "body": "I have not simply because he had this setup in place. I am not aware of anyone using NerMeeting, butI will ask David if he know anything about ."}, {"response": 11, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Mon, Sep  6, 1999 (20:43)", "body": "...make that NetMeeting...shall ask about it."}, {"response": 12, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Tue, Sep  7, 1999 (17:31)", "body": "Asked my son David about NetMeeting. His response: \"NetMeeting works pretty well. I tried it with a couple people and it is the standard conferencing tool for IT Corp. I just happen to like Webphone better and I already paid for it. \" IT Corp is the company he works for."}, {"response": 13, "author": "terry", "date": "Thu, Sep  9, 1999 (00:17)", "body": "That's what I have. I've had a few good exchanges with it, but it's been a while. Too bad these programs can't talk to each other. It's a polyglot world when it comes to comm programs, isn't it?"}, {"response": 14, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Thu, Sep  9, 1999 (00:48)", "body": "Most unfortuantely, I think it is \"buy mine and talk only to me.\" Otherwise we could actually hear each other! THAT would be really cool!"}, {"response": 15, "author": "terry", "date": "Thu, Sep  9, 1999 (08:32)", "body": "Tres cool. What's your contact information in your communicaitons program? You know, like your icq id or whatever."}, {"response": 16, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Thu, Sep  9, 1999 (15:02)", "body": "I use Instant Messages for Non-AOL users and my WebPhone uses my email address for my contact number. I had an ICQ # but it was so poorly explained I never did use it. Will send you for information by email as there are those I do not need to have it right now..."}, {"response": 17, "author": "terry", "date": "Thu, Sep  9, 1999 (15:33)", "body": "Understand."}, {"response": 18, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Thu, Sep  9, 1999 (15:52)", "body": "Anyone desiring to download or information on Instant Messages for non-Aol users http://www.aim.aol.com/netscape/whatis.html"}, {"response": 19, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Dec 17, 1999 (23:31)", "body": "Terry did I ever send you the information on ICQ you requested? I cannot remember doing so, and If I did not, I shall if you are still interested. I believe it was about my ICQ number..."}, {"response": 20, "author": "terry", "date": "Mon, Dec 20, 1999 (08:11)", "body": "Sure, we also have a topic somewhere for posting your icq number, maybe we should open one in inner. A topic like \"Contact information, icq number etc.\""}, {"response": 21, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Mon, Dec 20, 1999 (12:51)", "body": "That is probably a better place to reveal such information than out here on the public topics. The only one I have at present other than my own is Nan's, so I can put that there, as well."}, {"response": 22, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Mon, Dec 20, 1999 (12:55)", "body": "I also have an Instant Messaging program for which I do not wish the public to know my screen name. That would also fit into your parameters. I think that would really be a good idea to have all of the ways to communicate with each other in times of need. When You have time, of course, or I could do so...?!"}, {"response": 23, "author": "terry", "date": "Tue, Dec 21, 1999 (08:48)", "body": "Of course you could."}, {"response": 24, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Tue, Dec 21, 1999 (13:07)", "body": "Did *grin*"}, {"response": 25, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Sun, Feb 13, 2000 (00:44)", "body": "I know you have been terribly busy of late, but did you ever set your sister up with a communications application? If so, which one did you choose?"}, {"response": 26, "author": "sprin5", "date": "Sun, Feb 13, 2000 (08:11)", "body": "Not yet, she's got a new computer and I'd like to see her get set up with NetMeeting. ou know, sometimes, I just turn on the webcam live in my office and talk to folks that way. They get on icq and I get on the webcam with audio. I've got my notebook working as a mobile webcam now, using Roadrunner in my office."}, {"response": 27, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Sun, Feb 13, 2000 (12:17)", "body": "You must do that when I am not around. I'd love to do that...! But, first, I'd have to learn to use my ICQ program. When you wrote this, it was 3AM here. internet conference Main Menu"}]}, {"num": 29, "subject": "Nomadic Research Labs", "response_count": 75, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "terry", "date": "Tue, Aug 25, 1998 (16:24)", "body": "From wordy@qualcomm.com Tue Aug 25 08:30:48 1998 X-Sender: wordy@lorien.qualcomm.com Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=\"us-ascii\" Date: Mon, 24 Aug 1998 23:12:30 -0800 To: wordy@qualcomm.com From: wordy@qualcomm.com (Steve Roberts) Subject: Microship Status 8/24/98 (Issue #125) X-UIDL: c92a666a5e4da80e86739f146ca5c184 Microship Status 8/24/98 (Issue #125) by Steven K. Roberts Nomadic Research Labs IN THIS ISSUE: THE BUILDING IS DONE! NRL EXPANDING OPERATIONS ;-) CROSS-COUNTRY TOUR REPORT JAMMIN' ON THE DELTA NEWS UPDATES ------------------------------------- \"Don't get mad; get nomadic!\" -- Dan Burdick **************************************************************** This issue may also be found at http://www.microship.com -- click \"Latest Update\" for copy of this text with embedded links. These postings, distributed via email to about 2,500 subscribers, are archived there along with tech info and tales of earlier projects (BEHEMOTH and Winnebiko). Copyright (c) 1998 by Steven K. Roberts. All Rights Reserved. Personal forwarding and free online reposting are encouraged. Hardcopies by mail are $25 for a 10-issue subscription. **************************************************************** THE BUILDING IS DONE! I never believed we'd reach this point, actually. Eight months have passed since we rumbled out of Silicon Valley with three trucks and two trailers, bound for the mystical vision of an ideal Microship development lab near water somewhere in the Pacific Northwest. Desperate to get back to the project, we came frighteningly close to everything from a falling-down old shipyard in Blaine to a musty barn with crashable loft and rentable doublewide, but instead fell into a 6-acre slice of sociobotanical nirvana on an island in the Olympic rainshadow. We moved into a well-insulated and stylish little house and built a 3,000 square foot pole building back in the woods, with a hushed 750-foot sylvan commute connecting the two. It still seems dreamlike and surreal... like visiting the home of someone whose lifestyle makes me ache with longing. I've delayed writing this update (over 100 days since #124) because I assume that most of you would tire of hearing about the endless details of planning, building, roofing, pouring, wiring, lighting, dehumidifying, schlepping, and unpacking... at least until it was all over. I've been dragged deeply into things I know little about, written far too many checks for lumber, and sweated over building and electrical inspections. I can now stand around with neighboring homeowners, passin' the time o' day while jawin' about soffit ventilation, pros and cons of concrete vapor barriers, and what grade of gravel is best for a driveway. It's all been very interesting, I suppose, but finally we are turning on computers, organizing parts inventory, and thinking more about what will get the first Microship on the water than how to get a recalcitrant hank of 12-2 Romex around the overhead door. Flattening hundreds of boxes for the recycling pile while distributing their contents around the lab has a Christmas-like feel, but getting here was a dance through the minefield of costly gotchas. Humidity, for example, is not something I had to think about in California... but when BEHEMOTH's handgrips started growing white mold and moving limp boxes revealed damp patches on the slab below, I knew we had a problem. Not only are we dealing with the mysterious concrete-curing process, but we are also perched in deep northwest woods atop a shallow island aquifer... with no gutters or French drains yet to divert rainwater from the 4\" sponge that is our floor. Those are coming, but the first Band-aid was a 50 pint/day dehumidifier that's chugging away even as we speak, performing the ultimately hopeless task of wringing water out of the air in a forest clearing rich with mosses, ferns, nettles, and slugs. Another grand adventure in the critical path was wiring. Like most things, this follows my adage that there is an inverse relationship between the number of words required to specify a task and the amount of time required to complete it: \"Wire the building\" was one unassuming item on a 5-page TO-DO list. I should have given it its own page... We were fortunate to have consultation from a pro -- Bob Hansen, an electrician on the island, was kind enough to spend some time keeping us from doing anything that diverged too far from code. We added a new breaker at the shed, splitting incoming 200A service into two 100A branches (house and lab). 750 feet of buried cable later, power pops out of a PVC pipe through the concrete slab and into the lab's service panel. Here, ten 20A breakers feed GFI-protected chains of 4-plex outlet boxes; various 15A breakers handle some 20 fluorescent fixtures downstairs, local lighting in the offices, and a couple of 3-way circuits covering stairs and entry doors. All this is dead-simple in principle, but massive bundles of cable now adorn glue-lams, raf"}, {"response": 2, "author": "terry", "date": "Sun, Nov 22, 1998 (08:05)", "body": "From wordy@qualcomm.com Fri Nov 20 06:43:34 1998 X-Sender: wordy@lorien.qualcomm.com Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=\"us-ascii\" Date: Thu, 19 Nov 1998 21:26:00 -0800 To: wordy@qualcomm.com From: wordy@qualcomm.com (Steven K. Roberts) Subject: Microship Status 11/19/98 (Issue #127) X-UIDL: 3022a12a5ec81c51a1577a75d9805142 Microship Status 11/19/98 (Issue #127) by Steven K. Roberts Nomadic Research Labs IN THIS ISSUE: POWER MANAGEMENT SYSTEM CONSOLE MOCKUP LANDING GEAR AND RUDDER UPDATE MIMSY AND THE LINUX BOX RANDOM NEWS AND AN INVITATION ------------------------------------- \"It takes a village to build a boat.\" -- Tim Nolan, referring to the ever-growing volunteer population on the Microship project. **************************************************************** This issue may also be found at -- click \"Latest Update\" to see this text with embedded links; see the \"Microship\" section for a new overview of the entire project. These postings, distributed via email to about 2,500 subscribers, are archived there along with tech info and tales of earlier projects (BEHEMOTH and Winnebiko). Copyright (c) 1998 by Steven K. Roberts. All Rights Reserved. Personal forwarding and free online reposting are encouraged. **************************************************************** Hello from the Microship lab! Lots of progress on many fronts... with two test sails now behind us, there is a unfamiliar sense of reality that is speeding the project forward as never before. I look at the boatlet perched on her workstand amidst the fiberglass dust and strewn tools, and see something graceful and alive, poised for launch. Miss Piggy crackles heartily as she gobbles firelogs; the stereo pumps ancient familiar road tunes into this hastily-erected structure in the Camano Island woods. Pools of project detritus abound wherever you look: the zone of linux hackage in the corner, the FORTH hub and its nodes blinking away, the power management system sitting amidst bench clutter and a lineup of Fluke meters, Bob's desk awash in landing gear drawings and mechanical gizmology specsheets, a half-finished console frame model perched in the boatlab, Glass 'n Goo World a mess of 10-ounce scraps and encrusted epoxy cups, metal bits a-glitter in the machine shop, the latest fill curing in the Region of Dust, bins overflowing with parts in the Hall of Inventory, and paper scraps all over the floor of the Media Lab from a recent publication project. My office is a mess; my desk, just like every time before, has entropically degenerated into a loosely coupled 3-D information space of overlapping piles despite my constant vows to get organized. Oh well. The anal-retentive in me sees it all as a mess to be cleaned up; the adventurer shivers with anticipation... POWER MANAGEMENT SYSTEM In our last report, Tim Nolan (from Madison) had just spent a week building the controller that will spend its life surveying the on-board power scene to determine how much free solar energy is available for the thruster at any moment (assuming no emergency override). He returned last week, fresh from the Embedded Systems Conference, and dove back in... As before, he made astounding progress, nearly finishing the whole Microship power management system (Node P). Five power-cycled Microswitch Hall-effect sensors allow current measurement of both halves of the solar array (about 16 amps each), the battery, the thruster, and the console-full of system loads. In addition, it measures array voltage on the input side of the battery and thruster controllers, allowing a simple peak-power tracking algorithm to continuously \"twiddle the knob\" to maximize the product of voltage and current. All this system data is inhaled through a 12-bit A-D converter on the New Micros 68HC11 board... which actively babysits the battery via an interrupt-driven PWM algorithm, rations thruster power via a hack to the Minn-Kota controller, and reports all the gory details to our front-end server. After whipping all this out and getting it working, Tim had a couple of spare days... so he took on the next project: H-bridge control of the Minn-Kota steering motor. The thruster is deployed via this pivoting black box, into which indexes the heavy fiberglass tube that supports the motor itself and carries its power cables. The goal here was to allow manual or automatic control of thruster angle, calling, of course, for position feedback. Tim solved this neatly by gluing a couple of magnets into the nylon gear train of the steering assembly, using Hall-effect sensors to let the processor keep track of position and re-center the thrust angle if a crash ever knocks them out of synch. We're now shipping all the power components to him in Wisconsin for final refinement, transfer of circuits from proto-boards to perfboard, and algorithm-tweakage... whereupon it will all be ready to nail down in the console to establish the critical power infrastructure of the Microship. --> Minn-Kota"}, {"response": 3, "author": "aa9il", "date": "Tue, Mar  2, 1999 (21:08)", "body": "Greetings All Well, thought Id post to this topic and see if I can stir up some activity.... Any Spring folk who have been thinking about going nomadic? Or, perhaps, just adapting some mobile tech to their life styles - i.e. wearables, back pack portable OSCAR stations, high speed spread spectrum FHSS linking, etc.... Although not quite to the point going for autonomous mobile computing with on demand net access, I have been toying with some ideas for portable communications (possibly packet or satellite via the digital birds but I have to get the modems and a lap top for this...). Other crazy ideas include a suitcase dat with mixing board and two diskmans - mix my own radio shows while in transit or even do a rave thingy should the right environ and crowd converge at the proper moment. (Of course, that calls for a not-very-suitcase- portable PA system....) So any other experimenters out there trying this stuff out? Mike aka Cosmo AA9IL Riff Raff #39"}, {"response": 4, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Tue, Mar  2, 1999 (21:35)", "body": "not at the moment, no as for the future, who knows..."}, {"response": 5, "author": "ratthing", "date": "Tue, Mar  2, 1999 (22:37)", "body": "i just got a cool 2-way pager that does email. terry, OTOH, is a majorly wired geek. he has two cell phones, one of which allows for some fairly impressive internet connectivity."}, {"response": 6, "author": "stacey", "date": "Wed, Mar  3, 1999 (10:08)", "body": "Paul let me play with his email cell phone once... ooh la la! I am happily pagerless, cellphoneless, tvless... We do however have a cordless phone now (a friend lent it to us and I've taken quite the liking) --- makes me kinda mobile. I'm really to hep to the technological pissing contest... I like being \"out of range\" most of the time"}, {"response": 7, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Wed, Mar  3, 1999 (16:53)", "body": "huh-huh...I got to watch her play with it, too...huh-huh"}, {"response": 8, "author": "aa9il", "date": "Wed, Mar  3, 1999 (19:15)", "body": "Yow! Techno-voyeurism! ;-) Now, thats one of the minor debates I wage with myself regarding the whole connectivity bit. At one time, I had to wear a pager for work and I just it. There are times when I dont want anyone to be in touch with me, or be able to find me, or suss me out. Thats what 'off' buttons are for. OTOH, when Im in Austin on holiday, I usually carry 2 to 3 levels of ham gear with me to stay in touch with the local repeater. 1) A really cool little pico-walkie talkie (Icom Q7) for close in work. 2) A bit hefty-er 440 HT for those repeater fringe areas. 3) A portable Yaesu all mode 430/440 rig for mobile use - this is also my platform for satellite work once the satellite antennas get built.... As far as the wired geek thing goes... I would love to get a PCS phone with email and other net capability. That would be cool. I guess the uber-hack would be to have a wearable system with wireless connect and some kind of conformal micro keyboard or better yet a speech to text conversion routine to dictate mail. Throw in a digital camera to do those frame grabs during lunch at Shady Grove (burger and a 'Shady Thing') and zip off a few 'wish you were here' emails to fellow wage slaves stuck up in the frozen north and I would be set. Of course, once I have achieved true geek out status, then I have to do something 'nomadic'. Traipsing anound the northern IL burbs is not quite up there in the adventure category. The cool thing would be to go down to the Baja or look for the mysterious Marfa lights or do an expose at Burning Man. As stated B4, there will be times where I will want to be connected and other times I will not so all the above listed gear will include the 'off' button. Mike aka cosmo"}, {"response": 9, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Thu, Mar  4, 1999 (00:22)", "body": "amen"}, {"response": 10, "author": "terry", "date": "Thu, Mar  4, 1999 (06:37)", "body": "I guess the intermediate toy in all this is the new 2.4 gig cordless phone which supposedly has about a mile range. One of my ham friends, Bob Nagy, likes to mod these things with increased power and a better antenna. With a rooftop antenna attached to the base up about 50', you could have almost cellular capability with one of these new phones. Stacey was talking about my AT&T PocketNet phone, which, for $30 a month flat rate is very cool. You can surf info sites and get phone numbers and stock quotes and more, and you can send and receive any size email. I haven't \"worn\" a computer yet like the geeks at MIT, but that day can't be too far off and I'm kind of an early adopter. I geek toy of the year has to be the PalmPilot, I have a coupla dozen computers that I use 50% of the time and I have this Pilot that I use the other 50% of the time. I can't wait for the Palm VII even though I understand it will have lame Internet access and it will be limited. Someone needs to provide unlimited wireless access to the PalmPilot! Or a PalmPilot Cellphone/Pager/GPS! One of these days, we'll fire up http://www.cooltoys.net and start ecommercing some of the coolest toys we know about. By the way, Bob and I are co-hosting capzeyez on channel 10 in austin at midnight on Saturday Night. Right after Saturday Night Live, take in this Austin version of Wayne's World. He's Garth, I'm Wayne, ex cellllent, excelllent, shweeee . . ."}, {"response": 11, "author": "stacey", "date": "Thu, Mar  4, 1999 (09:37)", "body": "2.4 gig PHONE?!?!??! damn, my computer isn't that loaded..."}, {"response": 12, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Thu, Mar  4, 1999 (16:09)", "body": "mine either...*sniff*"}, {"response": 13, "author": "aa9il", "date": "Fri, Mar  5, 1999 (19:55)", "body": "Thats funny that most computers are running at a higher frequency than my uhf ham gear. Ah, I pine for the good ol daze where memory ended at 64K, programs were loaded from teletype tape or cassette tape (after you loaded the bootloader from the front panel switches) and BASIC was TINY. .... NOT..... Anyway, there are also some TV wireless thingies that are up in the 2.4ghz range. These can be modded to yield nifty amateur ATV transmitters and receivers. Speaking of microwave, I cant wait for TAPR to finish up those microwave spread spectrum FHSS sets. mike_aka_cosmo"}, {"response": 14, "author": "terry", "date": "Sun, Mar  7, 1999 (11:25)", "body": "Those 2.4 gigahertz units are *too* directional. I had hoped to hook one up to a video cam for relay to the webcam but they're not really suitable for this because they have little directional dish antennas. Hey, did you catch us on on Capzeyez last night?"}, {"response": 15, "author": "stacey", "date": "Mon, Mar  8, 1999 (14:58)", "body": "i did not (sorry) how'd it go???"}, {"response": 16, "author": "terry", "date": "Tue, Mar  9, 1999 (08:08)", "body": "It was funny. We'll be rerunning on the webcam this week. Check it out."}, {"response": 17, "author": "aa9il", "date": "Tue, Mar  9, 1999 (20:52)", "body": "Hey Terry Regarding 2.4ghz antennas and beamwidth, one solution is to use an omni-directional 2.4ghz antenna - radiates equally poor in all directions ;-) I should research what the FHSS 2.4ghz link in San Francisco was using for an antenna. When I visited Steve at Nomadic Research Labs near San Jose, he demo'ed web access using the link. Now, I would suspect that there had to be an omni on a mountain top and all the subscribers were using gain dishes. On to another topic - there was mention of a future Palm Pilot that would include a built in wireless modem and a capability to do text (?) web access via RF. Now, that would be pretty cool. I still would like to have something like the 'Private Eye' for my video - or even better, use the LCD view screen like the ones used in video cameras. This would at least allow graphics. One thing I need to do is hit the MIT web site for wearables and see what some of the current designs look like. I guess the biggest thing will be the RF coverage. To go back to a previous post, there would have to be extensive coverage even to places that are not highly populated - this might not seem too economical to the companies providing access. i.e. I should have perfect coverage around any big city and populated areas but Im not too sure what the coverage would be in, say, Black Rock desert or the southern tip of the Baja. (It would be interesting to see how folks at Burning Man stay in touch). For the really remote areas, it will have to be Inmarsat or Iridium to provide coverage. Anyway, blah blah blah..... mike aka cosmo"}, {"response": 18, "author": "terry", "date": "Wed, Mar 10, 1999 (10:14)", "body": "Our Spring partners, DDC and Mel Riser, have done an impressive wireless T-1 for the Dripping Springs area. And I'm looking to do something similar out in Bastrop. We need to kick this effort in to gear. Main stumbling block: the (necessary) day job!"}, {"response": 19, "author": "ratthing", "date": "Wed, Mar 10, 1999 (21:24)", "body": "same here. do you know that i am now working in corpus christi, TX?? YUK!!!"}, {"response": 20, "author": "aa9il", "date": "Wed, Mar 10, 1999 (21:58)", "body": "Sounds like a good plan to add the wireless T1 link's to the surrounding areas. Speaking of which, I picked up at a recent ham fest some Digital Microwave Corporation 23ghz tranceivers and their associated modems (T1). I have had thoughts of building up a 10ghz head to mate to the modems since the 23ghz components fall out of the ham bands. The modem IF is 70mhz. Most likely, there are way more modern components to build up a T1 link. I will probably gut the 23ghz components for 24ghz work and use the modem cases to house transverters. I am curious to see what will come of the FHSS project TAPR is working on. This would be a really big boost for high speed packet and net access. Up here near the Wisconsin border, I can see the Hancock building from 45 miles away at the lakefront. Line of sight is one of the basic requirements for microwave so you can imagine what kind of coverage that would be possible from the top of that building... Oh, yea, the day job is a necessary evil but it does pay the bills and finances my real engineering research. :) Mike aka Cosmo"}, {"response": 21, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Wed, Mar 10, 1999 (23:15)", "body": "...day job..."}, {"response": 22, "author": "terry", "date": "Thu, Mar 11, 1999 (07:42)", "body": "What's the FHSS project?"}, {"response": 23, "author": "aa9il", "date": "Wed, Mar 17, 1999 (22:29)", "body": "FHSS = Frequency Hopping Spread Spectrum (at least thats what I think it means....) Have not been too geeky as of late. Probably due to work burnout. What I have been doing is reading up on the micropower radio movement - picked up 'Seizing The Airwaves' when I was at Fringeware. Probably one of the better social studies on micropower radio. The next would be RadioText(e) put out by the Semiotext(e) folks (Autonomedia). Also, getting way overboard by reading 'Gone to Croatan' which appears to be this mega discussion of all the early nomadic tribes/groups in North America. And, if thats not enuf, also re-reading 'The Dharma Bums' which i find to be a nice Beat-Slacker kinda book. Its nice to do the total techno geekout with all the techie talk but its also nice to read up on the social side as well. (Perhaps someday to put to practice....) Have a groovy SXSW weekend mike_aka_cosmo"}, {"response": 24, "author": "aa9il", "date": "Sun, Mar 21, 1999 (15:14)", "body": "FYI The most recent Wired has an article about palm computers with a photo spread of all the latest geek toyz. Party On! -M-"}, {"response": 25, "author": "terry", "date": "Mon, Mar 22, 1999 (08:30)", "body": "I met a woman at Bruce Sterling's party who is putting up a micropower radio station in East Austin. Any suggestions to her as far as equipment. She plans on doing it legal, with the new regs going in to effect soon. If she does it, maybe I'll do one for my neighborhood in N Austin. I notice that the high school already has one that covers a few blocks. Lanier High."}, {"response": 26, "author": "ratthing", "date": "Thu, Mar 25, 1999 (08:13)", "body": "i used to run a low power pirate station (FM), terry, and i really just wired my equipment from scratch. i am guessing that if there is still a heathkit or edmund scientific still around then you could just buy a transmitter there. i would then go to radio shack for a mixer, mike, cassette player, and CD player. keep us posted here. i would like to get back into that game and maybe set up a low power station myself. legal this time!"}, {"response": 27, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Thu, Mar 25, 1999 (16:37)", "body": "Look-out for The Spring's World Domination Tour!!!"}, {"response": 28, "author": "aa9il", "date": "Fri, Mar 26, 1999 (18:11)", "body": "Check out the Free Radio Berkley page (gonna have to do a search since I dont have the URL...). Also search for key words like LPFM and micropower. There was a magazine out called Hobby Broadcasting which was dedicated to LPFM. That should be a good place to start. As far as gear goes, FRB sells kits as well as Panaxis and Ramsey. Go for it! Radio_Free_Cosmo"}, {"response": 29, "author": "aa9il", "date": "Sat, Apr  3, 1999 (22:50)", "body": "Well, this thread has been tooo quiet. Anyway, hope the microbroadcasting effort worked out. If it did, have to listen next time Im in Austin. BTW, interesting flame war on the technomads list as to just what constitutes a 'technomad'. Seems that homeless folks are getting wired and are accessing Yahoo and other services from libraries to keep up on email and such. Does anyone remember the SS Homer that was parked in town lake across from the Hyatt back in the late 80's? I guess the techno update to that story would be the same raft but with full net access on board.... Finally, just read the most recent 'Wallpaper*' rag which is published in the UK and caters to the jet setting trust fund weenies and other beautiful people. Anyway, good ol' Austin was covered in this with a short expose about where to hang and be hip. Of course, the warehouse district made the list as well as the Continental Club. I was pleased to see the GM Steak House and Ruby's as well but no mention of FringeWare. They missed The Crown and Anchor Pub as well. Oh well.... mike aka cosmo"}, {"response": 30, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Sat, Apr  3, 1999 (22:55)", "body": "ack!"}, {"response": 31, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Jan 14, 2000 (15:17)", "body": "I gave away my Dad's boat anchors to dedicated old time Hams who would know how to maintain them and would be inspired by the smell of burning Bakelite, the orange glow of the tubes, the hum of the rectifier, the charm of a butterfly condenser which had (for the smallest of them - the AVR) 110 turns from peg to peg...*sigh* My own Drake was stolen and replaced by nothing because the other person besetting me most sorely took the money and ran. When does the Spring World Domination Tour leave? His relatives arrive this afternoon. Is there time for me to get on board?! Pleeeeeeeease!!!"}, {"response": 32, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Tue, Feb 15, 2000 (16:56)", "body": "StenSat Released But Possibly Malfunctioning Little to nothing has been heard from the StenSat Amateur Radio picosat, raising fears that the tiny picosat has malfunctioned. Stensat was released February 10 by the OPAL ''mother ship,'' according to James Cutler of Stanford University. StenSat was one of two picosats released by OPAL--Stanford University's Orbiting Picosat Automatic Launcher. The other was the JAK payload. Since the deployment, stations monitoring StenSat's 436.625 MHz downlink have heard only very weak signals, or nothing at all. According to StenSat coordinator Hank Heidt, N4AFL, StenSat may be operating in an ''abnormal mode.'' The picosat was supposed to transmit a CW identifier and packet telemetry after deployment, but neither have been heard. Heidt speculated that it might be operating in FM transponder mode. Clifford Buttschardt, K7RR, reported hearing his transmissions repeated through StenSat on February 12 and 13, but signals were weak and the audio distorted. Weak StenSat signals also were reported by Johann Lochner, ZR1CBC, at the SunSat ground station in South Africa. The StenSat group asks amateurs to monitor the downlink and send reports to hheidt@erols.com. StenSat has a crossband repeater aboard that is designed to operate much like the popular AO-27 satellite. Hank Heidt, N4AFL, of the StenSat team has more information on the StenSat Web site at http://users.erols.com/hheidt/ ."}, {"response": 33, "author": "aa9il", "date": "Sun, Mar 19, 2000 (20:42)", "body": "Well, has anyone did anything nomadic lately? After another start of cleaning up large quantities of magazines and electronic junk (none of which is very portable...), thoughts of travel pop back up again. Still have not decided on what kind of travel - maybe just a bunch of short, intense, bike rides or maybe a jaunt up and down Lake Michigan - weather has to get a bit warmer for that tho... Regarding satellites, still waiting for P3D to go up which will then give me the chance to build up some neat portable uplink/downlink ham equipment to take on these proposed trips. Anything else going on out there? Mike aka _cosmo_"}, {"response": 34, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Mon, Mar 20, 2000 (12:15)", "body": "Mike, go out onto an island and you will be busier than the proverbial one-armed paperhanger. That's what they do in the Pacific and they are swamped every time they go. Check the DX information topic for the latest from AARL. I post it every week. The uplink/downlink equipment is to die for. Let us know how you are progressing while we salivate at the very notion!"}, {"response": 35, "author": "aa9il", "date": "Mon, Mar 20, 2000 (20:47)", "body": "I know that there is a group called IOTA (Islands on the Air) which activates islands for DXing. No real islands where Im at although it would be interesting to set up a station on one of the water intake stations in Lake Michigan near Chicago. The closest islands that would probably draw attention would be way up north near the Canadian/US border in the Great Lakes. Need to get back into DXing on the 'low bands' - most of my interest are up above 1GHz where working into the next grid square would be one step closer to VUCC (hence all the interest in a microwave P3D setup...) I do think it would be neat to visit some island and activate as part of a DXpedition. Guess I'll have to fire up the old HF station again..... 73 de Mike aka cosmo"}, {"response": 36, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Mon, Mar 20, 2000 (21:02)", "body": "If it has an IOTA number, you'll have them stacked so thick you cannot hear yourself respond. Out here (Hawaii) everything above sea-level has a separate IOTA number, and the annual field day for the local Hams involves setting up a remote on a little island in Hilo Bay. They are up all night and it is fun to keep track of the calls coming in. I think they works all bands except the EME ones. Looking at the freqs you work, you are into exotic areas. Fascinating! Good to see you posting, Mike!"}, {"response": 37, "author": "aa9il", "date": "Tue, Jun 27, 2000 (19:43)", "body": "Well, back again.... While taking a long lunch and goofing around downtown Chicago, I picked up a couple of 'zines that covered some aspect of nomadic travel - the first was the latest Utne reader which had a collection of articles dealing with the concept of how mobile/nomadic society has become. The other was 'blue' which was geared more towards the backpack/hostel/traveller/adventure bunch. Kinda did another quarterly evaluations (ugh - sounds like a blarmy performance appraisal...) of existance (mine) in regards to change in location. Well, the address is still the same so I guess I dont move around too much.... Anyway, back to the travel bit - started thinking about the concept of travel and where would I go under the circumstances. Senegal would probably be interesting - also the Seychelles in the Indian ocean. Figure Australia as well since that seems to be the direction at the moment. What to take? Ham rig, of course, bike, guess the laptop, nothing that resembles work, and whatever else fits in the Alice Pack. Ok, much better now.... Mike aka cosmo"}, {"response": 38, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Thu, Jun 29, 2000 (00:14)", "body": "Sounds fascinating, Mike. What an adventure. The Pacific is awash with little island ripe for IOTA pileups. Be aware that there are pirates in some waters, others just murder yachties (knew the Grahams who were murdered on Palmyra Island) and leave their bodies behind. I would suggest you either arrange for some sort of weapon to be at your disposal upon arrival, or stay in populated and friendly areas. Homework ahead of time can mean survival in the vast Pacific."}, {"response": 39, "author": "sprin5", "date": "Thu, Jun 29, 2000 (04:13)", "body": "The Grahams, was that the novel called \"The Sea Will Tell\" or something, I read that a few years ago. And it was a tv movie as well. Is this stuff pretty common out on these little islands, I mean piracy?"}, {"response": 40, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Thu, Jun 29, 2000 (10:38)", "body": "Yes, Mac and Muff Graham were the subject of both the book and the tv movie you mention. The guy and girl who did it are doing double life sentences somewhere on the mainland. It is not all that common. I listen to the Yachtie's net every evening on 14.313 MHz from 6pm till all yachts check in. Things happen. In the Indian Ocean it is even more prevalent and less reported than the Pacific. That the unthinkable happened even once is too many times. Several people have disappeared overboard. All of the situations went unprosecuted because in each case it was considered accidental. Who can tell about these thing. The piracy is very real and very active around Indonesia and west of there. I would recommend staying well away from there."}, {"response": 41, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Thu, Jun 29, 2000 (14:02)", "body": "Not sure where to pu this: Special Bulletin 10 - June 29, 2000 Antenna Designer Louis Varney, G5RV, SK Louis Varney, G5RV, who invented the world-famous G5RV antenna, died June 28. He was 89. The G5RV multiband wire antenna for HF is among the most popular of all antenna designs. Varney first described the G5RV in the November 1966 issue of the RSGB Bulletin. He employed a full-size and a double-size G5RV, both fed with open-wire feeders, at his own station. Varney remained an active radio amateur until very recently and kept regular on-the-air schedules. He was an RSGB member for 74 years and served as life president of the Mid-Sussex Amateur Radio Society. His wife Nelida is among his survivors. Services are set for July 4 in Brighton, England."}, {"response": 42, "author": "aa9il", "date": "Wed, Jul  5, 2000 (21:37)", "body": "No plans yet for the Pacific - have to make it through the Great Lakes first. Might have to look out for Wisconsin beer pirates tho.... I did hear the maritime mobile net on 20 meters this weekend. 14.313 seems to have a rep for a bunch of idiots that get on and cause QRM for the rest of the good boat folk. When I listened though, the net ran well. You would think that an important traffic frequency would be respected but there are some goofs out there. If I was out in the middle of the ocean, I would sure want to be able to check into the net without having to slog through past the cretins. Hope the net keeps going strong - its for a good cause. ok, off the soap box de AA9IL"}, {"response": 43, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Sat, Jul  8, 2000 (17:18)", "body": "That Maritime frequence is the target of more and more disruption. However, the closer to the Pacific you are, the better it is. People make contacts and move up or down 5 to talk. It is a good system and works splendidly most of the time. I am really sorry to hear of the intereference from clods and louts on the air. Years ago one guy was so obnoxions he had his radios and licence confiscated and put out of business...which probably did not deter him for long. He just found another net to harrass. It is the only net I know of which has actually saved lives. It is most important that it continue! Staying on the soapbox - it is a worthy enterprise!"}, {"response": 44, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Sat, Jul  8, 2000 (17:20)", "body": "Wisconsin Beer Pirates??! Your boat or your beer??? The mind reels with possibilities..."}, {"response": 45, "author": "aa9il", "date": "Sun, Jul  9, 2000 (23:06)", "body": "Actually, the Wisconsin Beer Pirates would be a good name for a sailing group. Have to figure how to work that in...."}, {"response": 46, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Mon, Jul 10, 2000 (00:23)", "body": "Yup!! Used to crew on racing dinghys in Hilo Bay, then ran the races to let some others win. Great name for a fun way to spend Sunday afternoon!"}, {"response": 47, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Wed, Aug  2, 2000 (17:51)", "body": ""}, {"response": 48, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Aug  4, 2000 (12:47)", "body": ""}, {"response": 49, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Aug  4, 2000 (12:49)", "body": "There are more lurkers out there than I knew. and I am delighted to correct anything I amy have posted incorrectly.Here is correction to the Graham saga: Concerning your coments about the Grahams.......who were murdered at Palmyra Atoll.........the \"guy\".....Buck Walker......was found guilty of murder and is serving a life sentence. The \"girl\"......Jennifer Jenkins......was found not guilty and is serving a life sentence nowhere. Just a correction........:o) Thanks Kaysman64"}, {"response": 50, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Aug  4, 2000 (12:51)", "body": "This email comment superceded the one above. I am grateful to Nickie for her tact and interest in making all of the facts known in this sordid chapter of Yachting in the Pacific: I noted in your \"Nomadic Research Labs\" correspondence (Response 40 of 46, dated June 29, 2000), that you believe Buck Walker and Stephanie Terns are both serving life sentences for the murder of Muff Graham (re: Palmyra Atol). In fact, Stephanie Terns was, through the efforts of her attorney, Vincent Bugliosi, absolved of any criminal collusion in Buck Walker's actions. Thanks, Nickie"}, {"response": 51, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Mon, Aug 21, 2000 (14:50)", "body": "Ham Radios in Space NASA Science News for August 21, 2000 Ham radio operators are notorious for their love of long-distance radio chats. Now, thanks to NASA's SAREX program, hams and students on Earth can enjoy the ultimate long-distance radio experience by contacting astronauts in orbit. FULL STORY at http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2000/ast21aug_1.htm?list"}, {"response": 52, "author": "aa9il", "date": "Sat, Sep  9, 2000 (13:32)", "body": "Although not very nomadic as of late, I want to mention that I did get to drive on a couple of sections of the old 'Route 66' last week. Didnt see any weird sculptures or eating places tho. Just lots of corn fields.... _cosmo_"}, {"response": 53, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Thu, Sep 28, 2000 (23:14)", "body": "Not even any exterrestrials?? The only place I have been on Rt 66 was between Flagstaff, AZ and Meteor Crater. The Crater was amazing. Rt 66 was just another back top road. I guess the romance is gone, moved it elsewhere or only lives in fantasies. I missed out on the 'scuptures' too!"}, {"response": 54, "author": "aa9il", "date": "Thu, Oct 26, 2000 (22:13)", "body": "Im pretty sure I mentioned this in another thread but one of the places most likely to run into ET's or other strange things was in the West Texas desert near Marfa. (didnt get to see the Marfa Lights tho...) de Mike radio cosmo international"}, {"response": 55, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Thu, Oct 26, 2000 (22:36)", "body": "Interesting. I wonder why they don't hover over tehCapitol building in Washington DC... or is it that they are looking for intelligent life in the universe.?! Any geologic anomolies in the Marfa area? Curious! Have you seen anything you could not explain away that you would care to share? I must be too stupid or boring, Nuthin hovers over me except mosquitoes!"}, {"response": 56, "author": "aa9il", "date": "Fri, Nov  3, 2000 (21:59)", "body": "I have read that the Marfa lights could be caused by plasma formed from rocks fracturing under high stress. Intelligent life in Washington DC? Yea, but they were only visitng.... :) No strange objects I could not explain - have seen the aurora, iridium flares, a comet, satellites, and even heard the sonic boom from the shuttle flying over head during re-entry. I wish I could see something unidentified but no luck as of yet. I should have driven out to Area 51 when I had the chance during a Vegas visit.... Mike radio cosmo international"}, {"response": 57, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Nov  3, 2000 (22:33)", "body": "*laugh* yup about Washington DC... just could not resist. If Iwere them I'd handgout over Cheyenne Mountain. Colorado Springs is very pretty now... I understand Area 51 is now vacated and relocated elsewhere. I've seen zodiacal light and Gegenshein and loads of green flashes and one turquoise flash along with abut 20 comets and innumerable satellites. Sonic booms but not from the Shuttle. Have seen the shuttle fly over and watched the first burnout ofEarth's orbit on the first moon trip. The last was just after having had dinner with astronauts on either side of me and across the table. Fascinating guys!!! Sunset rays are also frequent here. Oh, and the southern cross. The magellanic clouds are visible from here but just a little while per year."}, {"response": 58, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Nov  3, 2000 (22:35)", "body": "Piezo-electric rocks??? What is squeezing them???"}, {"response": 59, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Nov  3, 2000 (22:53)", "body": "or is it like the wintergreen candy my father used to snap in half for me in a dark closet and we would would see the spark made thereby. Inever figured out what caused it and I am sure he never told me. Anyone know??? (I had forgotten about it till just now!) Of course, I have seen earthquake lights caused by the earth fracturing. That is more than I need to see again...! It took a 7.2 magintude one in the middle of a very dark night to cause that!"}, {"response": 60, "author": "terry", "date": "Sat, Nov  4, 2000 (12:17)", "body": "Interesting stuff, Marci. Speaking of Nomadic Research Labs type stuff, Jay Leno is going to have the \"battlebots\" on his show next week, they're really awesome, I saw a preview last night."}, {"response": 61, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Sat, Nov  4, 2000 (13:27)", "body": "Oooh, also seen noctilucent clouds, and was reminded of the eclipses lunar which I have also seen. Alas, I missed the total solar eclipse HERE and the annular eclipse in California while I was there. Heavy clouds obsured even the darkening of the skies at totality in both cases. Do not come near me if you want to see things eclipse solar. The gods to not want me to see that. I did see the 3/4 eslipse many years ago in West Virginia and it was spectacular. Also another partial here for which I put up a pinhole porjector for public inspection in front of the college library. It worked splendidly. How do eclipses affect transmissions? I imagine solar totality could make for a lot of trouble on EME transmissions. Is that so?"}, {"response": 62, "author": "aa9il", "date": "Sat, Nov  4, 2000 (21:01)", "body": "Hi Marcia and gang Marcia - I have heard about the green flashes that occur when the sun goes down on the horizion - at what time did you exactly see it? That is sooo cool. Re Eclipse, Im sure there is some affect but not exactly what. I have witnessed several partials and there was a full eclipse many years ago but was too young to remember. During the partials, I would play 'Dark Side of the Moon' rather loudly on the tape deck and watch the eclipse though a SRONG IR filter combined with a welding goggle lens. I can still see so I guess it was sufficient but now I sort of know better.... I have hit my eyes with reflected HeNe laser beams and that really gets my attention - the ol' eyes survived that one too.... The one thing I do remember about the eclipse was that the light passing through the gaps between leaves in a tree caused many 'pinhole camera' images of the occulted sun to appear on the ground. The temperature dropped, birds stopped chriping, and the sky became magnificent blue. No wonder the ancient people freaked when eclipses happened. Regarding the flashes with rocks fracturing - I would suspect that the intense pressure when the fracture takes place would generate enough energy to cause plasma to form - especially if quartz is present - this is kinda getting out of my field so grasping at straws here - best to bring up on GEO. Terry - have to find out when the battle bots are on. Is that the robot battles that take place in the UK. I have a big interest in robotics and autonoma with several good publications on the subject from MIT but I can not pick up a new hobby or else I will never finish the microwave stuff. Its tempting tho.... Anyway, Marcia, have to describe your sightings regarding the flashes - plus seeing the Southern Cross is pretty cool. There was an old Crosby Stills and Nash song about the Southern Cross that I really liked. Its getting cold up north and the sky is clear now. Time for good stargazing. 73 de Mike radio cosmo international p.s. a nomadic journey to Austin is in the works and am I looking forward to that!"}, {"response": 63, "author": "terry", "date": "Sun, Nov  5, 2000 (07:44)", "body": "When are you coming to Austin? The battlebots will be on Leno next week. I'm not sure which night though. I'll let you know if I find out. There are three battlebots going against one they had custom built for leno, with a big image of his face and chin being used as kind of a front end scoop. There was one that looked very destructive. I also have heard about the green light, Marci. Is it more common out where you live and since you have those ocean sunsets?"}, {"response": 64, "author": "terry", "date": "Sun, Nov  5, 2000 (08:13)", "body": "I just reread this topic for the past year and it is one of the most interesting on the Spring! Everything from pirates to eclipses to battlebots! Maybe we should start a topic pirates of the South Pacific? Battlebots?"}, {"response": 65, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Sun, Nov  5, 2000 (13:44)", "body": "I just domup those things for which I have no other topic in to Geo 1... all things Earth. Found an interesting website about plasma last night recommended to be by one of 4 new conversats I met yesterday. I love a fascinating life online!!! http://members.nbci.com/hameltech/ scroll down for the discussion of plasma. Tlak about nomad..!!! Yes, you need a flat unobstructed horizon for the green flash and no obsucing dust particles in the air to aborb those blue and green wavelenghts. It is not an every day occurrance here but on the Kona side, fairly frequent."}, {"response": 66, "author": "aa9il", "date": "Sun, Nov  5, 2000 (17:07)", "body": "Checked out the hameltech page - now thats interesting stuff - kind of the thing you would see in the old Tesla Journals when they were being published. Re the battlebots - might have to stay up long enough to watch them in action. Kind of like Survival Research Laboratories with out the explosives. Next time Im near the gulf, have to watch for the green flashes. I have seen where the sun's rays hit mountain tops many miles away and cause a unique sunset. In the UFO news, I did see a high speed jet today at an incredible altitude - I saw the reflection against the sky. Moving fast and no vapor trail. And lastly, bolted the traveling wave tube power supply to the 19 inch rack in the basement - get this thing running and I'll have 10 watts at 10ghz - no birds better fly in front of the dish antenna during key down. 73 de Mike radio cosmo international"}, {"response": 67, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Sun, Nov  5, 2000 (18:39)", "body": "Yup, that Hameltech site is something else. I just joined a message board of people who had the oddest ideas. I will pass the best of them on to you here. I have a fresh lava flow to sell those guys. Get it while it's hot!!! Got seagulls??? If you do, one will manage to get in the way one time or another - hopefully not during keydown! Have seen plenty of intercontinental jets so far up there that not enough humidity exists to make contrails!!! The overfly Hilo regularly! Truly UFO's, but most assuredly airplanes"}, {"response": 68, "author": "sprin5", "date": "Mon, Nov  6, 2000 (07:45)", "body": "What's a traveling wave tube power supply?"}, {"response": 69, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Mon, Nov  6, 2000 (12:12)", "body": "Yeah, Mike... What IS a traveling wave tube power supply?! I thought I was the only clueless one here."}, {"response": 70, "author": "aa9il", "date": "Wed, Nov  8, 2000 (22:54)", "body": "Hi Yall A TWT (called 'twit\"...) is a type of microwave amplifier. Electrons pass as a beam through a coil (helix) under vacuum and at very high voltages. These amps have tremendous gain (1mw in and 10 - 15 watts out) At microwave frequencies, thats alot of gain. TWTA's comprise of the tube and a power supply which make up a travelling wave tube amplifier. The amp I have is telco surplus and was used for point to point stations working in the 10.7 ghz range. The plan is to use this amp for serious tropo scatter contacts at 10ghz but also, 10-15 watts is the lower limit for EME given a good sized dish. In other exciting news, one of the recent IEEE Spectrum magazines had a cover story on wearable computers - it is now possible to have a heads up display and a pentium class computer that can be worn on a belt. Only one more class in the semester then Im freeeeeeeeee! (until next semester.....) 73 de Mike radio cosmo international"}, {"response": 71, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Thu, Nov  9, 2000 (02:45)", "body": "Impressive! Thanks for the education. I wish I understood half what I know about these things... Anyway, it will not be wher I can eavesdrop on you if it is EME unless the prop is amazing when I do hear you. Have only been able to catch local guys once in a while, and that was with my Drake and an antenna switch for the unusual freqs. Notch filters help too, and alas, none inhouse have them. Next life all are on antenna switches and all have notch filters! Let us know how you fare. Ace those finals!!!"}, {"response": 72, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Thu, Nov  9, 2000 (16:29)", "body": "I posted this in Geo 35 for you, Mike, but there are some hams (one of who =m shall remain anonymons) who avoids Geo every chance he gets (*grin*) Leonid Meteor Balloon Rises Again NASA Science News for November 9, 2000 A team of NASA scientists and ham radio amateurs will loft a weather balloon toward the stratosphere on Nov. 18th to record the sights and sounds of the 2000 Leonid meteor shower. Readers can follow the balloon flight thanks to a live webcast at LeonidsLive.com. FULL STORY at http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2000/ast09nov_1.htm?list89800"}, {"response": 73, "author": "aa9il", "date": "Sat, Nov 11, 2000 (19:15)", "body": "Nomadic TV Just finished watching a goofy show on access TV tonite which made me think about nomadic radio but since I rant about radio all the time, thought I'd blab TV for a bit. I would suspect that the closest I could figure to ideal pirate TV would be fashioned after the TV crew on the old Max Headroom series. Underground and punk - existing in a video autonomous zone (read TAZ - The Temporary Autonomous Zone by Hakim Bey for the full scoop on that subject). What would it be? Found video, optical collage, subliminal mind control? Not quite sure.... Although pirate radio stories abound, I have not heard too much about pirate video springing up. The closest would be some of the stuff on access which leads back to my original opening comment. I guess webcams come kind of close but then again both originators and viewers must be on the net. Until all this does come about, I will be somewhat content to surf access to see what interesting video thoughts are zipping about. 73 de cosmo radio cosmo international"}, {"response": 74, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Sat, Nov 11, 2000 (21:34)", "body": "Can you get skip on TV under the right conditions? You have one huge ground plane in Lake Michigan!"}, {"response": 75, "author": "aa9il", "date": "Sat, Nov 11, 2000 (23:23)", "body": "I have received across the lake transmissions on VHF radio frequencies - cant say for TV since I have cable :) Now, I have received TV channels from across the Gulf of Mexico during a band opening - a Spanish speaking TV station on chan 3. Channel 2 was completely wiped out which is a good indicator of low VHF activity. (6 meters in the ham bands) - BTW, this happened when I lived near the Gulf many years ago in South Tx. After I posted the previous message I remember reading about pirate TV taking place in the old 'Eastern Bloc' - both in Russia and and East Germany. These were instances where individuals hooked up video recorders to master TV cable systems or regular transmitters. Now, Im sure there is some pirate activity in this country but only in the big cities. Now, Im sure there is some interesting programming (?) taking place in some of the remote parts of the country - Alaska and possibly the far north of Canada and the U.S. Also, there is probably some neat stuff that comes on after 2am aside from reruns of Happy Days and Three's Company. Thats one of the things about the alterna programming is that like any other unique programming is that one has to sift through the mundane to find those nuggets. mike radio cosmo international internet conference Main Menu"}]}, {"num": 3, "subject": "ftp", "response_count": 9, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "casino", "date": "Mon, Nov 25, 1996 (14:57)", "body": "Well Terry, I'm not sure whethter I'm supposed to post my question in this \"Response\" box or whether I'm supposed to submit it via e-mail to you? However, here it is nonetheless : I have the registered version of WS_FTP Pro, v.4.04, (patch applied to v.4.02), and when I install the latest beta, v.4.10, 96.11.18, the installation reports that my beta will expire in 30 some odd days. Do you know what will happen on the expiration day? Will I be stuck with nag screens, or perhaps the program will cease to fu ction, who knows? Anyone?"}, {"response": 2, "author": "terry", "date": "Mon, Nov 25, 1996 (17:23)", "body": "The best place to ask would be in the WS-FTP topic in the apps conference. Post it there and I'll try and get someone in the know to answer your question. OK?"}, {"response": 3, "author": "casino", "date": "Fri, Jan  3, 1997 (14:46)", "body": "Nevermind and thanks anyway, Ipswitch posted their v.412 Release shareware and then the WS_FTP Pro v.1.2 upgrade patch a day later, and all is d/l'd and patched and well now."}, {"response": 4, "author": "terry", "date": "Tue, Mar  3, 1998 (00:30)", "body": "A question came via email today that I didn't at first understand. -----Original Message----- From: Carol Curry [mailto:ccurry@poet.com] Sent: Monday, March 02, 1998 7:04 PM To: terry@www.spring.com Subject: text to avatar Terry, Do you know of a product and/or company that does text to avatar translation? We're building an NT-based content management demo and we want to include this feature. Thanks for any help you can provide. CKC Carol Kay Curry VP Marketing POET Software (650) 286-4640 ccurry@poet.com But when I asked around and found out this: I don't know if this fits the bill, but there used to be a ventured-backed startup called nFX out of the MIT Media Lab that did something that could be construed to be \"text-to-avatar\" stuff. They had a technology that allowed an animator to create a \"template\" for a cartoon character by feeding the system several line drawings of it in various positions and specifying areas of it as nose, eyes, etc. Once you did that, then it would automatically generate animations based on textual commands (literally stage directions: \"walk three steps to the left\"). Had wonderful potential for the web, as the textual commands were very low bandwidth and pretty comprehensive. It seems is still alive."}, {"response": 5, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Oct 29, 1999 (18:05)", "body": "I use CuteFTP which is a mercifully easy and lightning quick program my son recommended to me. I had to have help setting it up - which was kindly and patiently provided. Since then it is a joy to use and makes me look very good to those who do not have the capability."}, {"response": 6, "author": "terry", "date": "Fri, Oct 29, 1999 (20:48)", "body": "It's good. I use ws ftp out of habit, but Bulletproof ftp rocks, it's the UPS of ftp programs. Always gets your stuff."}, {"response": 7, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Oct 29, 1999 (21:33)", "body": "So far, CuteFTP has, as well, but I will save this to file in the event it lets me down - then I upgrade to Bulletproof (I take no prisoners!)"}, {"response": 8, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Wed, Dec  1, 1999 (19:22)", "body": "Not sure where to put this but it is important enough to put here as it is an FTP site for the Gutenberg Project. Don't know what that is? Check it out! ftp://archive.org/pub/etext/etext90/GUTINDEX.ALL Or the main page of the Project to put every extant book on the internet for free access (FTP the text to your hard drive) http://promo.net/pg"}, {"response": 9, "author": "cfadm", "date": "Wed, Jun 28, 2006 (15:07)", "body": "Filezilla. Google it. internet conference Main Menu"}]}, {"num": 30, "subject": "cyberactivism", "response_count": 4, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "terry", "date": "Sun, Oct 18, 1998 (21:57)", "body": "Ha Ha Ha Ha *8-) From weston@emoh.n0place.com Sat Oct 17 08:27:21 1998 Date: Sat, 17 Oct 1998 08:27:21 -0700 (PDT) From: weston To: nettime-l@Desk.nl Subject: wearing a paper bag Sender: owner-nettime-l@basis.Desk.nl Precedence: bulk X-UIDL: 12172264aa659b39be3e1085fb041850 > The following is from > \"An Open Letter from the President of the Friends United in > Creative Knowledge of the Faceless Attitudes of Corporate > Entities.\" > > > ********************************************* > > \"As we all know, in February of this year, a man walked into a Barnes > and Noble Superstore in Austin, Texas, wearing a paper bag with holes cut > for his eyes. He approached the front counter and politely asked the > clerk for assistance in finding a particular book. The clerk immediately > called for a manager to the front. An assistant manager appeared and asked > the man why he was wearing a paper bag on his head. In the now infamous > reply, the man said: 'I am tired of the corporate attitude which a > views me merely as a faceless consumer. And I am wearing this paper bag as > symbol of my protest against this sort of mind-set.' The assistant > manager then told him to either remove the bag or leave the store. Not > willing to give in any further to the disease, the man elected to leave the > store. > > This event was subsequently reported over the FringeWare News Network > and Midnight SPecial Bookstore's Disgusted with Superstores Opinion List. > And here in Dunwitch, a group of us decided that we had also had enough of > similar corporate attitudes. It was high time to take action. > Following the non-violent example of the man in Austin, we began to wear > paper bags into various Superstores around the area. We met with > remarkably consistent results: all of us were asked to either remove > our bags or leave the store. This was to be expected. But it only further > stimulated our outrage. > > Thus we have decided to hold a nationwide mass protest action at 12:00 > noon on the 23d of November of this year. What we have planned is for > thousands of paper bag wearing individuals to peacefully enter into > either Barnes and Noble or Borders Bookstores and browse for approximately > 15 minutes. Already, the response to this has been overwhelming. > Groups of individuals are being organized all over the world to join us in > the November 23d protest. > > If you are likewise fed up with being treated as a faceless consumer > by various corporations, please join us with your paper bag on the 23rd > of November. ... ANd if you are interested in further action, contact us > at: > Friends United in Creative Knowledge of the Faceless Attitudes of > Corporate Entities > c/o Fringe Ware Bookstore > 2716 Guadalupe > Austin, TX 78705 ......................................................................... n e t S I G N communications weston triemstra 110 west hastings weston@netsign.com vancouver, bc v6b 1g8 \"the future was now\" canada ......................................................................... --- # distributed via nettime-l : no commercial use without permission # is a closed moderated mailinglist for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: majordomo@desk.nl and \"info nettime-l\" in the msg body # URL: http://www.desk.nl/~nettime/ contact: nettime-owner@desk.nl"}, {"response": 2, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Sat, Jan 23, 1999 (11:24)", "body": "hmmm...don't remember hearing about this in the papers..."}, {"response": 3, "author": "sprin5", "date": "Sat, Jun  3, 2000 (10:55)", "body": "Declan Dunn and href=\"mailto:mnemonic@well.com\">Mike Godwin are filing a motion tomorrow to oppose an effort to shut the press out of the DVD-movie litigation. See http://cryptome.org/mpaa-v-2600-gmo.htm for the filing."}, {"response": 4, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Sat, Jun  3, 2000 (21:01)", "body": "That does not sound good...perhaps they will issue joint press releases (most unlikely considering they are in court over this.) internet conference Main Menu"}]}, {"num": 31, "subject": "y2k - the Year 2000 brouhaha", "response_count": 28, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "terry", "date": "Thu, Oct 29, 1998 (07:40)", "body": "http://www.salonmagazine.com/21st/log/ has an interesting discussion."}, {"response": 2, "author": "terry", "date": "Thu, Oct 29, 1998 (07:43)", "body": "Joe Nickell wrote a piece in Wired magazine about y2k. \" For those absent in byline, I'm being bombarded with vitriolic and often bizarre email about my story last week, \"Y2K: The Missionary Position.\" I'd be interested to know what folks think of the criticisms at... http://www.wired.com/news/news/wiredview/story/15875.html One person who wrote directly to me accused me of blaming Christians for the Y2K problems.\""}, {"response": 3, "author": "terry", "date": "Thu, Oct 29, 1998 (07:46)", "body": "Millennium pundit vs. Wired Hell hath no fury like a Y2K doomsayer scorned -- or so Wired News discovered when a story it recently ran, \"Y2K: The Missionary Position,\" provoked the wrath of Gary North, the vociferous millennium bug expert-cum-Christian economist. The story, by Joe Nickell, delineated concerns within some Christian organizations that scare-mongering about the year 2000 problem was running rampant in some conservative Christian groups. Although the story didn't mention North, he immediately posted a long response on his own site calling it \"smear journalism.\" The response included both a link to Wired News and \"substantial\" excerpts of the story, according to Wired. Wired Digital's lawyers, in turn, sent a cease-and-desist letter demanding that North immediately remove the text because \"it is a violation of federal copyright law ... to quote substantially all of an article.\" Now North is crying foul, suggesting that his First Amendment rights are being quashed as part of a liberal political agenda. Responds Wired Digital spokesperson Andrew De Vries, \"There was nothing ideological about it at all. He's posting a substantial piece of a copyrighted article without permission.\" North has removed most of the Wired text from his site, but he sounds like he's sure he'll have the last laugh. As he puts it on his site, \"I believe that Wired and the liberal world view that sustains it have only 15 months to go. Y2K will serve as my response.\" -- Janelle Brown SALON | Oct. 29, 1998"}, {"response": 4, "author": "terry", "date": "Thu, Oct 29, 1998 (07:53)", "body": "\" We had our first domestic Y2K problem yesterday when the no-longer- maunfactured but dependable budget program on my wife's aging Mac refused to take a \"00\" entry for a magazine subscription. We all get to watch now month by month as the thin chrome plating falls off the infotech God. *8-/\" - Bruce Sterling And from Bruce: ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: 28 Oct 1998 04:17:45 GMT From: Blake Leverett Subject: Real Life Y2K failure Here is a real-world example of a Y2K failure. A buddy of mine (call him \"Jim\") is the network administrator at a small (8 Mill/yr sales) company. I can't say the company name, so if you are going to whine about how I am making this up, don't bother reading on. But I am familiar enough with the situation (I know some other people there) to know that he is not making this up. It is a manufacturing company. \"Jim\" warned the company management over a year ago that the company's software would self-destruct in October of 1998 because of the year 2000 bug. It looks out 15 months into the future and although the software is configurable, it can't be configured to look ahead for a shorter time period. The software is an old DOS package, and it's not Y2K compliant. It runs everything from manufacturing documentation to accounting, payroll and accounts payable included. The company management dragged its feet until March. Finally, after \"Jim\" threatened to quit, they decided to shell out the $100K or so it cost for new software. Months of work followed by both the software vendor and \"Jim\" to make the switchover happen. Well, here it is the end of October, and the new system isn't up yet. They started too late, so the old software is still running, and is peeking over the Y2K boundary. There have been problems. The database files get scrambled on a daily basis. \"Jim\" has to edit these files manually with a hex editor to fix them. The headers get screwed up, and he uses a hex editor to side-by-side compare the old (good) file with the new (screwed) file. Then he guesses what to edit to make it limp along for another 4 hours. Sometimes the files can't be repaired, and the lost data must be re-entered from paper copies (if any exist). The real kicker came the other day when they ran Accounts Payable. They are a wee bit behind on their AP, so they paid out partial payments to many of their vendors. A total of $150K worth of checks was printed, and promptly mailed. Shortly thereafter, the system crashed yet again. The record of the latest checks was lost. Since a large number of vendors were paid, they now have no idea of what they owe to any vendor. It effectively destroyed all records of their AP. Y2K is serious. This little manufacturer is wasting lots of time fighting Y2K problems (100 man-hours this month so far), and is losing money from lost information. And they are in good shape - my friend \"Jim\" saw this coming and insisted that the problem be fixed at great expense to the company. He is a big asset to the company, so they listened when he threatened to quit. If he were mediocre, they probably would have called his bluff. They will be ready (supposedly) on November 1st. But there are THOUSANDS of similar small companies that haven't shelled out big bucks for a fix. They will start seeing problems soon. And the problems will get worse and worse as more routines look past 1/1/00. Although this company is experiencing lots of computer problems, the customers have yet to find out. The customers can only interact with the company via telephone with the sales or service departments (or www), so internal problems are easily concealed. But their efficiency and effectiveness has been reduced significantly. And it has cost them dearly both to fix the problem and to not have it fixed in time. I hope this provides a small example of what Y2K can do. Computers are boring and unimportant devices - until they quit working. There are very few companies that can survive for long without their data. Blake Leverett -------------------------------------------------------------------------- POLITECH -- the moderated mailing list of politics and technology To subscribe: send a message to majordomo@vorlon.mit.edu with this text: subscribe politech More information is at http://www.well.com/~declan/politech/ --------------------------------------------------------------------------"}, {"response": 5, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Sat, Jan 23, 1999 (11:28)", "body": "so, is the Spring here Y2K compliant? (I know we're Y2037 compliant...hehe)"}, {"response": 6, "author": "terry", "date": "Sat, Jan 23, 1999 (14:04)", "body": "Nope, gotta install a new motherboard before y2k. A straight Pentium motherboard should work."}, {"response": 7, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Mon, Mar  1, 1999 (00:57)", "body": "The State Department has issued an announcement about possible malfunctions of computer systems outside the United States as of Jan. 1, 2000. Financial services, including automated teller machines, credit cards, and banking transfers, may be affected, along with transportation, medical facilities and communications. The department said it would publish details as they become available and by Oct. 1, the consular information sheet on each country would note what was known about that country's preparations. These may be seen on the Internet at http://travel.state.gov/"}, {"response": 8, "author": "stacey", "date": "Mon, Mar  1, 1999 (13:43)", "body": "woo woo!"}, {"response": 9, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Mon, Mar  1, 1999 (21:25)", "body": "so, are you compliant, Stace? (or just pliant?...)"}, {"response": 10, "author": "terry", "date": "Tue, Mar  2, 1999 (01:00)", "body": "Or pliable?"}, {"response": 11, "author": "stacey", "date": "Tue, Mar  2, 1999 (09:31)", "body": "umm.... sometimes, often and it depends"}, {"response": 12, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Tue, Mar  2, 1999 (19:51)", "body": "depends on how and where you're nudged, right?"}, {"response": 13, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Fri, Mar  5, 1999 (13:45)", "body": "For information about the City of Austin's Y2K plans see http://www.ci.austin.tx.us/y2k/default.htm"}, {"response": 14, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Fri, Mar  5, 1999 (13:48)", "body": "and from their link page... The Year 2000 Information Center, considered by many to be the premier source for information on this subject, is a homepage on the Internet devoted to creating awareness of the Year 2000 problem. It can be found at: http://www.year2000.com/ The Year 2000 Information Center was created by Peter De Jager, a leader in Year 2000 awareness. . President's Council on Year 2000 Conversion, http://www.y2k.gov/ provides information on the council's efforts and has an interesting section named \"Recent Rumors\" under What's New. Time Bomb 2000: What the Year 2000 Computer Crisis Means to You! written by one of the world's leading authorities on software development, Edward Yourdon, together with his daughter, financial analyst, Jennifer Yourdon, is now a New York Times Business Best Seller. For information on this book go to http://www.year2000.com/products/NFy2kbooks.html . The Tenagra Corporation and Amazon.com Books have joined forces to highlight a number of Year 2000 books on this site. President Clinton's Speech on Y2K President Clinton delivered his first major remarks on Y2K, July 14 before the National Academy of Sciences. http://www.whitehouse.gov/WH/New/html/19980714-5571.html Key point: \"Because the difficulty is as far flung as the billions of microchips that run everything from farm equipment to VCRs, this is not a challenge that is susceptible to a single government program or an easy fix.\" Responding to the Y2K Challenge: A Primer for Local Government Officials on the Year 2000 Problem available at http://pti.nw.dc.us/y2k/docs/y2kwpap.htm Authored by Public Technology, Inc., this article provides insight into some of the issues facing local governments and the Year 2000 issues. Public Technology, Inc., is the non-profit technology research, development, and commercialization organization of the National League of Cities (NLC), the National Association of Counties (NACo), and the International City/County Management Association (ICMA). PTI\ufffds mission is to advance the development and use of technology in local and state government. Texas Department of Information Resources Year 2000 Project Office available at http://www.dir.state.tx.us/y2k/project/itn.htm This website offers information on state-level Year 2000 programs and progress reports on various state agencies. United States Senate Special Committee on the Year 2000 Technology Problem http://www.senate.gov/~y2k/index.html"}, {"response": 15, "author": "terry", "date": "Wed, May 26, 1999 (09:49)", "body": "http://www.know-2000.com/ But the explanation, which is particulary good, about the three specific problems with pc hardware is here: http://www.freey2kdownload.com/overview1.htm"}, {"response": 16, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Tue, Jun  1, 1999 (12:35)", "body": "http://y2k.state.fl.us/"}, {"response": 17, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Sun, Feb 13, 2000 (00:47)", "body": "So much for Y2K... Is everyone as tired of sardines as I am?! (No...we really did not do that!)"}, {"response": 18, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Fri, Feb 18, 2000 (15:54)", "body": "\"What'll I do with all the ammo?\" must be THE big topic on some cocktail parties."}, {"response": 19, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Feb 18, 2000 (16:04)", "body": "Does anyone besides me think it was a not-to-clever ploy to feather nests and pad bank accounts? Gadzooks! Ammo?! Lamp oil, but no ammo that I know about!"}, {"response": 20, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Fri, Feb 18, 2000 (16:19)", "body": "Well, all those survivalists, wait what happens when all their wares hit the market... What would a garage sale look like? I mean, they were prepared for everything (\"They won't get the tv, and they won't touch the Camaro...\"), so they must have stocked at least a dozen rounds per neighbour. All this stuff was very expensive, and I believe many people who are not extremely rich have serious amounts of capital bound in these items. Now, if they want to pay the post-Y2K mortgage, or the next rate for the car, or whatever, something's gotta go, no?"}, {"response": 21, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Fri, Feb 18, 2000 (16:25)", "body": "I have once read a comment by an arms dealer, who supplies warring parties large scale, that arms never go away. One side looses - the winner keeps their own stuff, plus reaps the losers gear. To finance reconstruction, they sell arms surplusses of. These end at another point of conflict with a fighting party, who'll win or loose. Thus, guns and cannons and all kind of gear circulates around, all the time, all around the world. That stuff doesn't *vanish*. It gets stocked up, until it's used, and after use, it's sold or restocked until the next time. Does anybody have a statistic on how many more firearms and ammo were sold in 1999 than in other years? Worldwide? In the US?"}, {"response": 22, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Feb 18, 2000 (16:32)", "body": "I would also be most interested in knowing that statistic about personal firearms sales pre-Y2K. I shall hunt for that. By now, it is well known that war is profitable. It pulled us out of the Great Depression and numerous other depressions. It stabilizes population overgrowth and makes pukas in the ground which hide undetonated ordnance for decades. War is arguably a Good Thing...but not by anyone who is sane! I am still put off by my son's lovely and excellently made Krupps coffee maker...!"}, {"response": 23, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Feb 18, 2000 (16:38)", "body": "As for the survivalists, they are sure the end of the world is upon us in any case and are paranoid about just about everyone and everything. Listen to Art Bell on the Internet if you cannot get it locally on your radio. They will never part with their underground bunkers and tunnels, nor their ammo and guns, nor their very expensive survival food and fuel. Their children are held in a state of seige all of the time and are home-schooled. What does this say about the generation of children of these people coming into adulthood? Frightning!"}, {"response": 24, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Fri, Feb 18, 2000 (16:51)", "body": "Marcia, that's not Krupp's, that's Krups. Different company. You can drink that coffee with a untroubled mind... Unless, that is, Krups is owned by an evil company... But then, everybody owns everybody elses stock these days, I guess. Nobody is innocent anymore."}, {"response": 25, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Feb 18, 2000 (17:06)", "body": "This is true. Thanks for the clarification. I should have realized it! I have ITT stock which has been into just about everything for good and evil over the years. It is my little way of staying in the game for world domination, of course... *laugh* You are right, the loss of innocence is universal."}, {"response": 26, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Sat, Feb 19, 2000 (16:26)", "body": "Yeah, Universal, too, I guess. The biggest joke was this dutch pacifist band in the eighties who were signed to EMI, and Thorne-EMI was big into what professional bullshitters call defense industry."}, {"response": 27, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Sat, Feb 19, 2000 (17:04)", "body": "Offense Industry?! Ah yes...they have all of the money, don't they?! Spin doctors are everywhere and can make that silk purse out of a sow's ear without as much as a snip or a needle. Everything is euphemisms nowadays lest we really find out what they are doing in all actuality!"}, {"response": 28, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Mon, Feb 21, 2000 (11:48)", "body": "NEW BUG WARNING - FOR FEBRUARY 29 Businesses are being warned to watch out for new computer software problems - hard on the heels of the Millennium Bug. On February 29 some computer operating systems could go haywire as they fail to recognise that 2000 is a leap year. Leap years come every four years except at the turn of each century. But every 400 years the rule does not apply, which makes this year a leap year after all and tacks an extra day on to February. internet conference Main Menu"}]}, {"num": 32, "subject": "time", "response_count": 2, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "terry", "date": "Tue, Nov 24, 1998 (16:51)", "body": "Swatch Launches A New Time For New Digital Era: Internet Time CAMBRIDGE, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Nov. 21, 1998-- - participants at MIT Media Lab's Junior Summit first to use Swatch Internet Time to rethink time for the new millennium - Still trying to figure out Y2K? Swatch has expanded the new millennium challenge with the launch of a whole new concept of measuring time in the future: Swatch Internet Time. Presented in Cambridge this week to the more than ninety kids from fifty- four countries participating in the Junior Summit at MIT's Media Lab, Swatch Internet Time is global time for a cyberworld. \"Cyberspace has no seasons and no night and day,\" Nicholas Negroponte, Founder and Director of the Media Lab said, in introducing Swatch Internet Time at the Junior Summit. \"Internet Time is absolute time for everybody. Internet Time is not geopolitical. It is global. In the future, for many people, real time will be Internet Time.\" Swatch Internet Time represents a completely new global concept where there are no time zones - no geographical borders to time. Swatch has divided up the virtual and real day into 1000 \"Beats\". Each Swatch Beat is equivalent to 1 minute 26.4 seconds. Swatch also created a new meridian for Internet Time at the Swatch headquarters in Biel, Switzerland. Biel Mean Time (BMT) is the universal reference for Internet Time. How does Internet Time work? A day in Internet Time begins @ 000 Swatch Beats --- or midnight BMT (Central Europe Time). That means that 12 noon in the old system is the equivalent of @500 Swatch Beats. For the participants at the Junior Summit who come from virtually every time zone in the world, Internet Time simplifies the process of scheduling on- line chats once they return to their homes. For new friends from China, India or the U.S., Internet Time is the same for everyone. Confused about calculating Internet Time? Just check the Swatch web site (www.swatch.com) or the CNN web site (www.cnn.com). In addition to posting the Swatch Internet Time, both web sites also provide a list of cities worldwide with the corresponding Internet Time posted for each. Beginning after the first of the year, Swatch will make keeping up with Internet Time even easier with the introduction of its first digital watch, Swatch Beat. The first models of the Swatch Beat watch available anywhere in the world were presented to the Junior Summit participants to use during the week of meetings and project development at the Media Lab. The young leaders not only incorporated the Internet Time concept into their scheduling for the week, they used their watches and Internet Time to launch their own discussions regarding new ways of thinking about time in the new millennium. In addition to Internet Time, the bold new watch offers functions that display local time, time in another time zone, a fixed countdown to the Y2K (Year 2000), a timer, a stop function and an alarm. In true Swatch style, fun is also part of the Swatch Beat. This is provided by three animations by three famous cartoonists - the Swiss artist Gerald Poussin, J. Otto from the USA and KM 7 from Japan. Every watch is equipped with one of these animations. Three very different-looking dogs jump around the dial, play with a bone until they have no energy left and then conclude the story against a lamp post. This is all made possible by a specially designed \"Sandwich\" LCD. A unique combination of tow LCDs allows one to be used for numericas and the other for a full screen animation. Swatch Beat is Swiss-made, water-resistant to 30 meters and has quartz precision. Swatch is proud to be a partner of the Junior Summit, presented by the Media Lab. The Junior Summit, held at the Media Lab from November 15th through the 21st, was developed to allow kids to have a say in the use and design of technologies which will determine how they work and communicate as tomorrow's adults. The Swatch partnership with the Junior Summit continues its tradition of support of global concerns including programs of the United Nations, the World Wildlife Fund, UNICEF, the Olympics and the Boys and Girls Clubs of America, in addition to sporting events, art and cultural programs around the globe. Swatch is a division of The Swatch Group, the world's largest watch manufacturer and distributor with 14 brands and a global leader in microelectronics. In addition to Swatch, the Swatch Group brands include Omega, Hamilton, Longines, Tissot, Rado, Calvin Klein and Flik Flak watches."}, {"response": 2, "author": "terry", "date": "Wed, Nov 25, 1998 (14:23)", "body": "What's the Internet time, someone? internet conference Main Menu"}]}, {"num": 33, "subject": "Cyberdawg (jonl) Barking", "response_count": 3, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "terry", "date": "Wed, Nov 25, 1998 (14:22)", "body": "CYBERDAWG BARKING // 11/26/98 // fry them turkeys! a bucket of loose thoughts: Lessee, now that this AOL/Netscape merger can dominate front pages and involve, not millions, but BILLIONS of dollars, I guess that we can resolve that the Internet is truly ubiquitous. Not only that, but we can relax and accept that Bill's world is also Steve's (at a party Steve Case once told a friend of mine that he sees the Internet as a seed community for AOL.) For those who perceive web-based commerce as a true killer app, this is a logical step forward toward second-nature status for the Internet as an integral part of daily life, like the telephone. Cultivation of ubiquity, seen through various niche filters as supportive of fringe culture, teilhardian spiritual evolution, sophisticated memetic envirnonments, community networks, etc., appears to be a Good Thing for many reasons, but ultimately it works because it feeds consumers to the engines of commerce. And though it's often vogue to assume the worst about commercialization vis a vis exploitation, those of us who're building and operating those engines can mitigate the more extreme effects of unbridled capitalism by integrating online markets with community, like the street markets around which human communities have always grown and flourished. We can build online communities and support community networking. These are not the same: online communities are contexts for social gathering and affinity building, and community networks are technological infrastructures for ensuring the broader distribution of Internet access, as well as social infrastructures to provide training and guidance for those who fall under labels like 'traditionally underserved.' I have a whole other danger/opportunity rant knocking around in my head, but no time this morning to flesh it out...more soon. cyberdawg"}, {"response": 2, "author": "terry", "date": "Wed, Dec  2, 1998 (13:48)", "body": "Cyberdawg: The Y2K Scam I've had enough. A few days ago Jerry Falwell characterized the \"Y2K bug\" as something like a message from God that we're screwing up, and at that point I'd had enough. Well, okay, if God thinks we're screwing up, she's right, but when were we ever NOT screwing up? And it's true that the Y2K problem results from an inherently human lack of foresight. But the real human failing here is the propensity for kooks and charlatans to construct doomsday scenarios around a manageable technical problem. Even programmers and analysts, who should know better, are overstating the problem, possibly to drum up consulting business and possibly because, even for reasonably intelligent folks, belief is just a swallow away. There are a couple of Y2K myths I'd invite you to consider. Because I don't write code and don't work with systems that are sensitive to century, I won't pretend to speak with complete authority...but I do have some Y2K background, and this is my somewhat informed thinking. First, what is this problem? For the sake of efficiency, programmers of many systems adopted a century-insensitive format for storing dates, like MMDDYY, where YY is the year stored as two digits, 1998 stored as 98. Hindsight tells us that this was a mistake, but nobody seemed to realize how long that code would stay around. Myth #1: We didn't realize we had a problem until it was too late. I was on a state agency's Y2K project team something like 4-5 years ago, and I hear that they're wrapping up the project right now. It is possible that they missed something, but given the time and thought accorded the problem, I figure anything they missed will be relatively minor. My agency wasn't exceptional...many agencies, banks, insurance companies, and corporations with large legacy systems using century-insensitive formats have also been working for several years to analyze for exposure (the hard part) and make fixes where required. The SEC requires public companies to file a Y2K status report. It's simply not true that no one's been dealing with the problem. Myth #2: Because computers and microprocessors are ubiquitous, our systems will crash around us on Jan 1, 2000. I see this one everywhere: \"Do you realize how many microprocessors you depend on for your day to day existence? They're in your car, your television set, your coffeemaker, etc.\" The implication is that, wherever there's a digital system, you have exposure. This is muddy thinking, though, because most systems don't \"care\" what year it is. Your coffeemaker is not going to be confused when the date rolls over from 99 to 00, even if it's not \"Y2K compliant.\" Where you might have a worry is with something like a credit card which shows an expiration date of 01/00 or later. But as many of you know, those cards were already issued, and some did have problems. Where problems occurred, they were fixed fairly quickly. No Big Deal. I welcome refutation, but disasterwise, I'm a lot more worried about random meteor strikes than about Y2K. If Jerry Falwell wants to save the human race, give him a space ship and a huge net. cy ber dawg"}, {"response": 3, "author": "terry", "date": "Fri, Jan 15, 1999 (15:45)", "body": "Cyberdawg's 1998 Top Ten List! Absent-minded as I've become, any ten things about 1998 that I can actually remember deserve to be on a list somewhere, so here 'tis, in no particular order... 1) Bill Clinton was busted for bad sex and political hell broke loose in DC, and the party-line divisions within the U.S. generated gaping crevices, sort of like in those earthquake movies, fragmenting the hell out of leadership and punditry. However the economy kept breathing and and ordinary citizens were remarkably consistent in their support for a president whose moral confusion didn't seem to affect his ability to hold the meetings and make the speeches that keep the ship afloat. 2) People in general seemed remarkably complacent about chaotic, often catastrophic weather conditions. As one hurricane followed another, we wondered whether global warming might be more than a nifty subject for an illustrated Scientific American article. Bruce Sterling, ever attentive to heavy weather, started an email list around his Viridian design concepts, building psychic infrastructure for a greening of the elite. 3) The Federal government asked the musical question, is Microsoft a monopoly? And if so, should we Do Something About It? The answers are probably yes and yes, in that order, but the quandary is what to do about it, what remedies the court will suggest. Meanwhile a cocky but elegant operating system called Linux finds increasing market share and mindshare, not because anyone is spending millions on marketing, but because it WORKS. (see #10 below) 4) I'm not sure that it's news anymore when we bomb the living fuck out of Iraq. Maybe they're really building bombs over there, and growing mutant viruses for germ warfare, making mustard gas derivatives, etc. Maybe they're evil, maybe they're scared. Maybe we think we're dead if we don't have a war going on somewhere. I just wish I could have more trust, but I guess I've seen too much. 5) The Internet is an industry. Corporations are spending millions of dollars on web sites and Internet marketing. Investors are pumping kazillions into Internet stocks of unproven value. We suspect that someone has sprinkled pixie dust over Wall Street. It's called \"the long boom,\" and it's as real as immor(t)ality. 6) Then again, the Internet really might work as a channel for retail distribution, in which case some of those investments might just make sense. Retail to consumers over the Internet feels like a killer app; ecommerce projects were coming on strong by the end of '98. Delivery's a big deal here, so UPS, Fedex, USPS, Airborne, and possibly new carriers will benefit from an explosion of net-based commerce (and their infrastructures will be challenged, as well). 7) I always figured that the universe was only expanding until it was ready to contract, i.e. a grand-scale pulsating universe, but I don't know anything about physics or astronomy. It just seemed to make sense. In 1998, space-time theorists gathered paradigm-shattering data using new tools, such as the Hubble space telescope and way powerful new computing systems. I'm not an astronomer and don't have a clue how to interpret the data, but I keep faith in a vision of the universe-as-heartbeat. But who knows? Maybe the Firesign Theatre had it right: everything we know is wrong. 8) This one's personal: I completed a book, _Virtual Bonfire_, in 1998, but it was never published. Though it was probably the wrong book for me to write, I learned a lot while writing it, so the considerable costs of a four month sabbatical, barely impacted by the small advance, were a form of tuition. The concept was to write something like Alinsky's 'Rules for Radicals' specifically for online activists, but I drifted into the metaphysical, trying to make sense of democracy and political process. Like I said, \"the wrong book.\" Alinsky was more practical than philosophical. Jon L. was trying to be both. The best (i.e. most practical) part of the book, a guide for creating online activist groups, didn't say enough about how to be effective once you've put the group together. Fact is, online activist groups haven't been terribly effective. Those who were most effective in getting the word out managed to orchestrate call-ins, fax-ins, and email petitions, but these had little weight compared to fleshmeets and money. We were unable to prevent passage of the Communications Decency Act despite solid opposition within the online community, and the CDA's content regulations would be law today if not for the ACLU's work on the court case, which took money and time and was quite grounded in the physical. The effectiveness of corporation donations to CDA opposition far outweighed the impact of the substantial efforts to organize the denizens of cyberspace. Jerry Berman of the Center for Democracy and Technology once told EFF-Austin that we should charter a bus and take our members to Washington, DC to visit our legislators where the action is, and let them see tha"}]}, {"num": 34, "subject": "Internet2 (I2)", "response_count": 15, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "wer", "date": "Fri, Jan  8, 1999 (18:31)", "body": "The Internet of the future, based on I2 developed technology, will support very high-speed interaction and an entirely new set of sophisticated, interactive applications. It should be a sequel everyone will want to watch."}, {"response": 2, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Sat, Jan  9, 1999 (17:26)", "body": "The University Corporation For Advanced Internet Development (UCAID) http://www.ucaid.edu is billed as the official site of the project"}, {"response": 3, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Sat, Jan  9, 1999 (18:51)", "body": "Internet 2 http://www.internet2.edu is one of the best general resources on the project"}, {"response": 4, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Sat, Jan  9, 1999 (18:55)", "body": "The Dartmouth College I2 site http://www.dartmouth.edu/comp/news/i2/index.html"}, {"response": 5, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Sat, Jan  9, 1999 (18:56)", "body": "Johns Hopkins University site on I2 http://www.jhu.edu/~hac_ns/internet2"}, {"response": 6, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Sat, Jan  9, 1999 (18:58)", "body": "University of Missouri-Columbia I2 site http://www.cs.missouri.edu/i2"}, {"response": 7, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Sat, Jan  9, 1999 (18:59)", "body": "Rutgers University http://www-i2.rutgers.edu"}, {"response": 8, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Sat, Jan  9, 1999 (19:00)", "body": "Georgia Tech http://www.hpc.gatech.edu/Internet2/i2apps"}, {"response": 9, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Oct 29, 1999 (23:43)", "body": "The government perspective http://www.anl.gov/MREN/workshop/jackson/tsld001.htm covering such topics as Internet 2 Applications Campus & Related Facilities Campus Networks Campus-to-Gigapop Connections Gigapops Inter-Gigapop Connections Protocols"}, {"response": 10, "author": "terry", "date": "Sat, Oct 30, 1999 (00:56)", "body": "Cool. Gigapoop. Bob Nagy did a fab film of the internet 2 conference, and I can't wait to see it if only for the pictures of Carrie Heater ."}, {"response": 11, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Sat, Oct 30, 1999 (02:13)", "body": "Ooooh! Not technical interest entirely, then?! Gonna show it on SpringCam?"}, {"response": 12, "author": "terry", "date": "Sat, Oct 30, 1999 (09:31)", "body": "I'd love to, Bob said I could at some point."}, {"response": 13, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Sat, Oct 30, 1999 (17:42)", "body": "By all means. let us know!!!"}, {"response": 14, "author": "terry", "date": "Sun, Oct 31, 1999 (16:17)", "body": "Yep. Bob had an awesome sound track at Leighton's Halloween party last night. Catch the sounds and pictures on our main page."}, {"response": 15, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Nov  5, 1999 (20:27)", "body": "Every time I try to watch something in there it is frozen on something like the close-up of an elephant or some blond lady I do not think was you... internet conference Main Menu"}]}, {"num": 35, "subject": "Gary Chapman", "response_count": 10, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "terry", "date": "Mon, Mar  9, 1998 (18:14)", "body": "Oh Boy! Softball Coverage in the LA Times *8-/ - Bruce Sterling Digital Nation March 9, 1998 Ad-Hocracies Fill Void Left by Government By Gary Chapman Copyright 1998, The Los Angeles Times AUSTIN, Texas -- The highlight of every Computers, Freedom and Privacy conference is the closing speech of novelist Bruce Sterling, and this year's was no exception. Sterling, a respected science fiction writer who lives in Austin (and who is a friend of mine), is becoming the Jonathan Swift of the digital era. The speech he delivered at the conference here two weeks ago was simultaneously hilarious and thought-provoking. He started by scoring off the earlier keynote speech by Brian Kahin, a former Harvard University () researcher who now heads the information technology program of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. Kahin delivered the administration's viewpoint on the role of government in shaping the Internet. Kahin said, \"The private sector should take the lead, and the government should play a modest, minimalist role.\" This has become the mantra of the Clinton White House whenever the Internet is the subject. \"I have confidence in self-regulation,\" Kahin said. Sterling called the presentation \"a very congenial and gentle speech: 'Modest' was a word he used a lot. I don't think I've ever, ever heard an administration science and technology expert describe the aims of American government as 'modest.' This was a remarkable confession this gentleman was making. In so many words, he said that policy development is cyberspace is just plain too hard to do. . . . So they'll simply, modestly step back and let the mighty forces of technology and private enterprise thrash the situation out on their own.\" This, Sterling said provocatively, is \"the giant sucking sound of abdicated responsibility. So what fills the power vacuum? I would argue that it is already being filled by a different and more modern political arrangement: not bureaucracy, but ad-hocracy.\" He called the audience's attention to the way Silicon Valley technology companies are starting to take on the form -- or rather, formlessness -- of Hollywood production teams. Instead of the conventional model of a corporation that plots its longevity into eternity, the new model of high-tech business is a collection of talented people who come together for the ephemeral goal of modeling a \"concept,\" and then selling it off. The team then evaporates, leaving no trace, like quarks in a linear accelerator. The only persistent quality is the \"talent\" of individuals -- a model Hollywood has pioneered and refined to an art. This phenomenon has developed in part because of the omnipresent shadow of Microsoft. Smart people try to create and then cash in on ideas before Microsoft appropriates them for the next release of Windows and puts them out of business. Sterling believes that this model, which has overtaken the mind-set of entrepreneurs in high tech, is now creeping into politics -- particularly as we think about the future of the Internet or new media in general. Deregulation, the buzz word of the past decade, is giving way to no regulation (or self-regulation, which amounts to the same thing). \"You don't have to stretch too far to perceive this as a menace to democracy,\" Sterling said. Ad-hocracy is \"certainly a real and visible menace to the established order, because it can throw sand in the works at any of a hundred different points. When the established order hits back, it hits back with another, rival ad-hocracy.\" \"Ad-hocracy\" is becoming gospel in high-tech centers around the country and in Washington. The problem, however, is not simply that this idea produces friction with democracy. The new high-tech ideologists don't really believe in democracy or in \"public values.\" They are bent on convincing the public that interest group politics, \"ad-hocratic\" atomization, and a kind of digital update of Social Darwinism are equivalent to democracy. Thus the public is presented with a false choice about the future of the Internet: a choice between either ham-handed bureaucratic regulation or a Hobbesian world of raw market power. The alternative of a truly democratic communications sphere dominated neither by government nor commerce does not seem to be on the table or part of the debate. After his discouraging description of our predicament, Sterling rallied everyone at the conference with a call to party: \"There's one important thing about ad-hocracies, a charming quality they have. If you just get them outside of the video surveillance, and away from their podiums and microphones, and add a little social lubricant in the form of a couple of beers, they spontaneously disintegrate into parties.\" So party we did, at Sterling's house in Austin, setting aside for a brief time the troubling thoughts he had lodged in our minds. Gary Chapman is director of the 21st Century Project at the University of Texas at Austin. He can be reached at gary.chapman@mail.utexa"}, {"response": 2, "author": "orange", "date": "Tue, Mar 10, 1998 (01:53)", "body": "hummmmm i thought i just posted here, oh well. glad you put up the chapman article. i agree, it isnt an entirely swell idea to leave this to the corporations."}, {"response": 3, "author": "terry", "date": "Tue, Mar 10, 1998 (02:43)", "body": "I posted it twice because I realized that it fit better in the Bruce Sterling topic just as much as it deserved to be posted here."}, {"response": 4, "author": "orange", "date": "Tue, Mar 10, 1998 (17:29)", "body": "any idea when the chapman audio will run on spring right now is more from the conference (which i always enjoy) i will just keep it on in the background as long as i can maybe you will be able to replay the chapman interview several times."}, {"response": 5, "author": "terry", "date": "Tue, Mar 10, 1998 (17:50)", "body": "I'll have to transfer it from super 8 to vhs this afternoon, you'll see it as I do the transfer (which will be the best video and audio quality you'll ever see, because it will come straight from the source). Then I'll put it on replay. I'll try and and start this at noon CST."}, {"response": 6, "author": "orange", "date": "Thu, Mar 12, 1998 (21:32)", "body": "darn, i could not manage to fit it in yesterday, i hope it will still be running now and then, i have been going over to the cfp98 site and clicking on the audio links over there to pick up specific seminars when i have an hour or so when i can stay and listen-- but i enjoy watching your video along with your audio much more. i think it is fantastic that you are putting this online terry, and very very unique the only outfits i know who are doing this are the major news servers and freespeech tv---which is often way too raunchy for me. btw, you know that idea that was discussed over at the Well about making posts to the server, able to be sent by email--i really like that-- i didnt realize how much i like it--until one of my main elist groups, decided to get on a permanent server and go to a threaded conference forum, and i dont have the time really to set aside to go over there and check the new stuff---i really miss when they were sending it to me by email would it be really hard and difficult to set that up here? i would want it for specific conferences/topics but i know how busy you are, and dont mean to bury you in extra projects."}, {"response": 7, "author": "terry", "date": "Thu, Mar 12, 1998 (23:38)", "body": "That's a very good suggestion and I'll get a quote from Kaylene Thaler on doing this!"}, {"response": 8, "author": "orange", "date": "Sat, Mar 14, 1998 (19:57)", "body": "good!! i would enjoy participating in that--in specific areas of interest i think jeff over at acme has set up a version of it, but i havent seen it in operation, might be good to have your programmer open a discussion somewhere on the pring (and be sure to tell me where) about how it would work, and what features people would like to see, and what is possible to do)"}, {"response": 9, "author": "terry", "date": "Mon, Aug 24, 1998 (15:19)", "body": "What happened to orange?"}, {"response": 10, "author": "terry", "date": "Fri, Jan 15, 1999 (15:54)", "body": "Monday, January 4, 1999 The Los Angeles Times DIGITAL NATION The Future Lies Beyond the Box By Gary Chapman Copyright 1999, The Los Angeles Times, All Rights Reserved Reporters and columnists attempting to sum up developments in the high-tech field in 1998, or speculating on the big stories for this year, are all ticking off what one would expect: the boom in Internet commerce, the Microsoft antitrust trial, highflying Internet stocks, the resurgence of Apple Computer, the merger of America Online and Netscape Communications, the rise of open-source software such as the Linux operating system, and the year 2000 bug, among other notable subjects. The interesting developments I saw in 1998 were mostly in research laboratories, and they pointed to a profound rethinking of how networks operate and information is circulated. The buzzwords to watch this year and beyond are \"embedded\" or \"ubiquitous\" computing and \"distributed\" computing, terms now used by computer scientists to describe a reorienting of how we'll use networking and information technologies in the future. This new paradigm, whose building blocks only began to appear in 1998, will be the next big thing in computing. Embedded or ubiquitous computing refers first of all to the trend of putting computational and networking capabilities into devices and services other than the familiar \"screen-keyboard-box\" of the personal computer. We're seeing a huge shift among technology companies that are looking beyond the PC toward a proliferation of hand-held network devices such as 3Com's PalmPilot, a new networking cellular phone from Microsoft and Qualcomm, a promised palmtop system from Apple and electronic books from Rocketbook and Softbook, among other related products. Compaq's Western Research Laboratory in Palo Alto, which the company acquired when it bought Digital Equipment Corp., has even produced a working prototype of a hand-held computer that runs Linux. At the Internet Society convention in Geneva in July, I frequently heard the slogan, \"IP on everything, everything on IP.\" IP stands for Internet Protocol, the basic data standard that allows information to be \"seen\" or passed around on the Internet. With everything on IP and IP on everything, nearly all our common, everyday devices will be \"smart\" and \"on\" the Internet: cars, refrigerators, household appliances and light switches, manufacturing tools, TVs, cameras, sensors and even smart cards in our wallets or purses. In order to get all these devices to talk to each other and to be identified on the network, we need a new standard of software that's small, platform-independent and ubiquitous itself. Sun Microsystems' solution is called Jini ( http://java .sun.com/products/jini/), which was previewed for developers in 1998 and will be formally announced Jan. 25 in New York. Jini is based on Java, the programming language that runs on a \"virtual machine\" that can be included with any operating system. Jini-enabled devices contain \"agents,\" small segments of software code that tell other Jini machines what they do, where they are and how they operate. A Jini-powered house, for example, would show up in a Web browser or on a PC desktop displaying its capabilities, such as the ability to turn lights on or off, inventory its refrigerator or cupboards, set the temperature, check phone messages, etc. This is how embedded computation and distributed computing intersect: Machine intelligence shifts from general-purpose computing, such as in a PC, to device-specific intelligence, and the network itself becomes smart as an aggregate of billions of devices performing specific tasks and sharing information. The network architecture may change too. Instead of the familiar client-server model we use today, distributed computing allows a peer-to-peer architecture, which means that there's no longer any need for large, centralized computers running huge operating systems such as Windows NT. Jini resources can \"see\" one another without having to be switched through a server, and Jini agent software can run in under a megabyte of memory space. Microsoft is aware of the threat this model poses to its core software products. It has its own version of the Jini approach, called the Millennium Project. Lucent Technologies has one called Inferno ( http://www.lucent-inferno.com/) , and General Magic, in Sunnyvale, Calif., has a product called Odyssey ( http://www.generalmagic.com/technology/odyssey.html) . This is where the money and research are headed these days. Another interesting and related development is under investigation at Caltech in Pasadena, a program called the Infospheres Project ( http://www.infospheres.caltech.edu/) , directed by Caltech computer science professor K. Mani Chandy. The Infospheres Project, funded by the U.S. Air Force and the National Science Foundation, grew out of the tragedy of TWA Flight 800 near Long Island, N.Y., in 1996, Chandy says. After the airliner blew up, a large array of ins"}]}, {"num": 36, "subject": "Will interactive talk shows on the web be a hit?", "response_count": 4, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "terry", "date": "Wed, Jan 27, 1999 (08:41)", "body": "From today's Forbes: It's a long shot, but a talk show might be more compelling when it moves from the radio to a PC. Webcasting By Nikhil Hutheesing KENNETH WILLIAMS netted $150 million in stock from the $1 billion sale of his computer game company, Sierra Online, to Cendant Corp. in 1996. A year later he retired, after wisely selling the Cendant shares, planning an oceanfront estate in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico and a 62-foot Nordhaven yacht to go with it. Then he got bored. \"The house is impractical, and the boat is a paperweight,\" he complains. Instead, Williams, 44, decided to start another company, this one to provide interactive talk shows on the Web. Is this what digital convergence is all about? Maybe. The intersection of broadcasting and computer technology was supposed to create huge new opportunities for profit, and big companies like Time Warner have dissipated tidy sums trying to find them. But the earliest success stories may come from modest endeavors like Williams'. Williams figured that the proper model was neither video on demand nor sports nor hard news, but rather talk radio. He got the idea when his wife, Roberta, asked him to find a way to funnel Seattle talk shows to their future home in Mexico. Williams hooked up with Jarold Bowerman, who had run marketing and product development at Sierra Online, and in November 1997 they founded Worldstream Communications in Bellevue, Wash. Williams invested $3 million; Bowerman added $100,000. Williams hired six technical people and lured James Golden away from his job as producer of Rush Limbaugh's radio talk show. Worldstream Communications' Web site (www.talkspot.com) offers shows on 3 channels; Williams expects to offer 100 shows by the end of the year. The topics range from news and politics to sex (an economic engine of every new medium since Gutenberg's day). In a typical show the host interviews a guest to the accompaniment of video and still photographs. You get the audio over your computer's speakers (as long as you have a recent browser); on your screen you get the video plus text-based discussion between the host, guests and the audience. The discussion can change the course of the programming. Example: A newscast on the recent U.S. attacks on Iraq might send the audience off on the tangent of high-tech bombs. This flexible format requires the host and the producers to react, say, by quickly pulling up a picture of a smart bomb. It's not enough to find such a picture in an instant; you must also be able to speed it to the viewers. Worldstream tries to get around the chronic logjam on the Internet by anticipating where the discussion is going, calling up the right images and sending them to your computer's memory before they're needed. That way the producer can unveil them instantly when the time is ripe. To make all this happen, Williams wrote some 15,000 lines of software code in Java to compress audio, text and images. Will all that hard work pay off? It won't be easy to lure couch potatoes and advertisers to the Web. \"People won't give up TV to watch something on-line,\" says Daniel King, an analyst with LaSalle St. Securities in Chicago. \"That's why ABC doesn't produce television shows exclusively for the Web.\" Worldstream must also face down broadcast.com, its main webcasting rival. Unlike Worldstream, broadcast.com doesn't try to make its own content, but broadcasts stuff from such companies as ABC and ESPN. Another difference: broadcast.com runs conference calls for investors and corporations. Its revenues jumped 171% in the first half of 1998. Williams expects revenues\ufffdmostly from advertising and subscription fees\ufffdto hit $2 million in 1999 and rise to $50 million in 2000. \"People will run home from work to turn us on,\" he says. That sounds a mite optimistic to us. But hey, if Williams loses his $3 million investment, he'll still have $147 million left over\ufffdand a Mexican estate that will be ready to live in by April."}, {"response": 2, "author": "terry", "date": "Wed, Jan 27, 1999 (08:47)", "body": "I tried http://www.talkspot.com and the interface was pretty slick. It's a text chat window with real audio running. Which reminds me, we need to focus in on a good chat system here. We could be doing what they're doing with our live webcam, all we need is the chat."}, {"response": 3, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Fri, Feb  5, 1999 (23:44)", "body": "definately intriguing..."}, {"response": 4, "author": "cfadm", "date": "Sat, Jul  1, 2006 (20:24)", "body": "TalkSpot is still around and growing, they have a 10 second signup and then you watch a video. internet conference Main Menu"}]}, {"num": 37, "subject": "Laura's Internet Stock Report - copyright Laura Lemay", "response_count": 8, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "terry", "date": "Thu, Feb  7, 2036 (01:52)", "body": "Topic 317 [investment]: Hot & Not, Internet Stocks & Investments #190 of 190: nucking futz (mtrbike) Fri Feb 5 '99 (10:04) 93 lines alexsf wrote: > my ebay! sos! Oh Ebay! My Ebay! The NASDAQ day is done, The Internet has held its course, the prize we sought is won, The highs are near, the bell I hear, the analysts exulting, While follow charts the steady gain, the bubble firm and daring; But O stop! loss! limit! Oh the bleeding ticker red; where on the board my Ebay lies, Fallen cold and dead. Oh, I am so very sorry. $_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$ Carnage yesterday and today in the NASDAQ. Yesterday's 83 point losss was the 3rd biggest point loss in history, and today's 50ish points loss so far isn't looking too healthy either. Although given that the NASDAQ had been climbing really quickly in January (up almost 15% for the month), a corective loss of a couple percentage points can be viewed as a good thing. (this is your opportunity to get in on some of those big tech names you've been meaning to buy). Speaking of big names, the big news in the tech sector is the scary news from AMD yesterday that Intel is eating its lunch (of course, AMD seems to announce this same news every few years and really, the whole POINT of AMD is to run catch-up behind Intel, so one wonders why this is a surprise, but anyhow). The news of price wars in the chip indsutry has put the serious fear into the big tech names, and where the big tech names go, so goes the NASDAQ. Red, red, red. $_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$ Last time I talked about all the excitement in online brokerage stocks. To follow up on that report -- the excitement continued yesterday, with those same stocks continuing upward to record levels (they, like most of the techs and internets, are down again today). Except for one. Etrade (EGRP) picked the worst possible time to have technical problems. The glitch they had on wednesday continued into thursday, with the howls of many furious traders resounding across the country. The New York attorney general got into the act, announcing it would launch an \"inquiry\" in the practices on the online brokerages based on the hundreds of complaints he had receieved about etrade. Etrade is down 15% today (more than the market). $_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$__$ Egghead is rumored to be a takeover target by Amazon, so that Amazon could get into the software market. Bunch of analysts are sniffing at that rumor, pointing out that Amazon gets books from Ingram, and surely they could get software from Ingram Micro. Egghead is up slightly in a down market. Lycos is rumored to be in a possible deal with NBC/GE. This goes back to the old takeover/media deal rumors that have been floating around for a while now. Lycos is also up. Yahoo splits today after the closing bell. $_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$$_$_$_$_$_$_ Bunch of IPOs today. Pacific Internet (PCNTF), singapore's biggest ISP, priced at $17, opened at $88, and is trading at $55 or so. Today's other biggie is Modem Media Poppe Typson (MMPT), which priced at $16, and just opened right this moment at $62. Also today are an enormous GM spinoff, Delphi Automotive (DPH), priced at $16 and trading at $18, and Del Monte Foods (DLM), yes, the del monte fruit packing company, priced at $15 and trading at $15 3/8. I include these last two to note that these are how IPOs *usually* work -- the enormous leaps on day one are an internet phenomenon, not an IPO one. $_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$ The Victoria's Secret fashion show on wednesday was watched by over 1.5 million people, most of whom were journalists. However, given that they had only expected 500K, most of those people didn't manage to get in, or got in and couldn't see things very clearly. The horror! Many of said journalists weighed in on this tragedy, explaining that the Internet is still a new medium, and that we still have a long way to go before the technology matures. So now we know the goal: the internet will be mature medium when as many people who want to watch live underwear models can do so. $_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$ Laura's Internet Stock Report is copyright 1999 (c) Laura Lemay lemay@lne.com Permission is Granted to forward as long as this copyright remains intact."}, {"response": 2, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Fri, Feb  5, 1999 (23:47)", "body": "even more stuff to think about..."}, {"response": 3, "author": "terry", "date": "Mon, Feb  8, 1999 (19:08)", "body": "it's L O N G today! Lotsa news after a spectacular NASDAQ day. Another one of those bizarre techs-rule-the-world days. DJIA down, NASDAQ and S&P up. But there are many worried noises coming from analysts about the NASDAQ, mostly because there are fewer and fewer stocks drving it up. The so called advance-decline line -- the proportion of stocks in the NASDAQ that go up versus those that do down -- has been turning negative, and that's not a good sign. But the nasdaq is a weighted index, with only four stocks accounting for 40% of the index (the four horsemen: Microsoft, Intel, Dell and Cisco), so if those four stocks do well, the NASDAQ will still *appear* to do well, even if the rank-and-file are falling over. If the four horsemen fall, though...ouch. Watch out. Ralph Acampora, a Wall St talking-head from Prudential Securities, said that there's a potential of a 5-10% correction in the markets, tech stocks in particular. Given that Mr Acampora has been right in the past (particularly in last october's itty bitty bear), his comments are being credited with spooking the broader market today. Speaking of lack breadth in the nasdaq, internet stocks are not amongst those on the upside. The IIX index was down only 1.31%, but the internet blue chips were down much wider than that. Amazon down 7.5%, AOL down 4%, Etrade down 7%, Lycos and Yahoo down 10% apiece. All except Ebay, which is up on no apparent news -- guess they sold off a bit too much last week and people thought there was value there. $_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$ Keyword today: wireless! There's a cellular/wireless conference going on this week (Wireless '99, there's a clever name), so lots of big tech companies are trotting out thier wireless announcements, stuffed full of acronyms only wireless geeks understand, including: + Cisco and Motorola announced a joint wireless IP project, to offer wireless internet access as soon as august (Lucent had already bought a wireless internet access provider earlier). + Motorola on its own joined with Nextel and Netsape to offer a wireless telephone package to offer voice, data and internet access through a cell phone. + Schlumberger announced that they've done a survey that said that people want cell phones with smart cards in them (for things like prepaid cellular). Given that no one else seems to want smart cards for anything, its worth a try. + Tomorrow Nortel will announce something called \"Mobile Webtone,\" which is apparently not a swing band. It sounds suspicously like the same thing Cisco and Nextel are both doing with wireless internet access. + Spyglass, the company that used to do browsers and which has been casting frantically about for a business model ever since, announced a \"content delivery platform\" that will convert internet content into differnt formats that can be read by devices such as PDAs, TVs, and cell phones. Gee. and here I thought HTML WAS SUPPOSED TO BE DEVICE-INDEPENDENT IN THE FIRST PLACE (sound of teeth-grinding). + Not to be outdone, the only two tech and telecom companies left, Microsoft and British Telecom also just announced an internet-over-cellphone project as well. So there you go, everyone throw out your computers, we'll all be using cell phones to read our email in the next year. $_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$ Microsoft is supposedly reorganizing to better focus on consumers and the internet. When I was still working for big companies, a reorganization was a sign of weakness, something to be gotten over with and hushed up and accomplished as fast as possible. It was expensive and painful and ugly. Microsoft's reorganization is being hailed in the press as a fabulous move, a terrfic idea, and the best way to position Microsoft for the new millenium. The stock was up 5 to 165 (3%). $_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$ Intel is expected to cut prices on its Celeron chips this week, bringing the price of an entry level PC to somewhere around $1.35. Intel was up 5 1/8 to 132 11/16 (4%). AMD, which makes most of its income from low-end chips, and announced last week it will lose a whole lot of money to Intel this quarter, is expected to repond to the news by bursting into tears. $_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$ Computer Literacy bookstores, which keeps insisting that it is an internet stock, is changing its name. But it won't say what its changing it to. Why? Domain name squatters, those carpet-baggers of the new media who register bunches of domain names with names close to a corporate name in hopes of being able to sell them for big bucks to the company that needs them (or to another company that hopes to take advantage of misdirected potential customers who cannot type). If Computer literacy announced, for example, that it was changing its name to, oh, caterwaul.com, then immediately the squatters would register caterwaul.net, caterwaul.org, catterwaul.com, caterwall.com, the-catercaul.com, catarwaul.com, and so on, and computer literacy would have to either pay up for all these oth"}, {"response": 4, "author": "terry", "date": "Tue, Feb  9, 1999 (18:48)", "body": "Yuck! Blargh! Ick! Gross! Bad market day! Ugly market day! Few bright marks in the markets today, not even in the tech stocks: The DJIA was down 158 points (1.78%), the S&P was down 27 points (2.22%), and the NASDAQ was down its third-worst 94 points, almost 4%. The Internet stock index? Brace yourselves. Down 6.71%. Its bad market days like this where its hard not to get obsessed with the short term, particularly since I'm here almost every day reminding you about it. And with internet stocks, every time there's a dip everyone always wonders -- is this the end of the bubble? Is this the crash? is this when it all ends? The answer? Well, yes. Could be. Hard to tell. Could be just a short-term correction. Part of the reason I write the internet stock report is to point out how ridiculous it all is. Stocks that go up 300% on no news. Stocks that go up 300% on stupid news. Stocks that drop by half on rumors being spread around on internet message boards. Day traders who quit thier stable day jobs because they think they can make far more money trading internet stocks on E-trade for four hours a day. The internet sector is effectively investment as extreme sport. But you know, motocross is an extreme sport. Motocross gets your heartrate up, you get in great shape, its a lot of fun....but it also has a tendency to give you really ugly bruises and scrapes and you occasionally break things like legs and collarbones. And spines. Which is why quite a lot of people think that motorcross is just too dangerous, and if you're going to do a sport, maybe something like golf is a MUCH better idea. And there's nothing wrong with that. What you have to figure out, as an investor, is if you're a motocross kind of person or a golf kind of person. Or somewhere in the middle. If you own an internet stock, and it drops 30%, 40%, or more, are you going to freak out and set yourself on fire? Even if you were up 40%, 50% the month before? Then maybe you should be buying something else. Or maybe you should be selling some of those stocks when they run up, lock in some of those profits. Or play in the internet with some amount of money that you won't mind losing (keeping below your setting-yourself-on-fire threshold). Sports analogies! I've really sunk low. Moving on. $_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$ As I posted earlier in a news alert, the big internet news today is USA Networks purchase of Lycos. It was a really complex purchase, difficult to figure out. But from the moment it was announced, investors didn't like it much, and as the day went on, they decided they liked it even less. Lycos closed down 33 (26%) at 94 1/4. Ouch! The fact that USA Networks did NOT pay a premium over Lycos' existing market cap weighed heavily on the sector as a whole, and cast a pall over future mergers. The top ten point losers today were all internet stocks: Cnet, down 25 3/4 points (20%), Ebay down 18 1/8 points (7%), Yahoo down 17 7/8 points (11.26%), Ameritrade down 15 15/16 (18.57%), CMG down 14 3/4 (13.53%), Go2net down 13 1/2 (12%). $_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$ Network Solutions (NSOL), aka the internic, is having its own problems, badly timed with the internet sector problems. Its first problem is that Our Government is supposedly examining NSOL's monopoly on internet domain name reigstration, with an eye for breaking that monopoly. The other problem is that NSOL is about to issue a secondary stock offering of 4.58 million shares. A secondary stock offering is somewhat like an IPO, in that its a way for a company to sell stock to the public -- except that secondaries get much less brouhaha, and, in fact, are often considered kind of a bad thing, because it means the market will end up with a whole lot more shares on the market. More supply, less demand, lower prices. Particularly bad for NSOL's shareholders who held the secondary stock -- the offer priced at $170 last night, but NSOL closed at $148 today. $_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$ Ross Perot supposedly made some comments today about how the internet sector is dangerous and speculative, and warned investors not to get involved in those stocks. Given that Mr Perot's company, Perot systems, came public last monday at 18, rose as high as 85 and 3/4 and as been sinking ever since, including losing 12 points (20.73%) today to settle at 46 1/8, well, I propose to take up a collection to go whack Ross Perot repeatedly with a rolled up newspaper. $_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$ 3Com Park. Network Associates Coliseum. Staples Arena. Arco Arena. And now, perhaps, the Yahoo! Pavillion. The San Jose Mercury News rumors that Yahoo! is talking to Bill Graham persents about putting its corporate stamp on Shoreline Ampitheatre in Mountain View. Both Yahoo and Bill graham deny the rumors, but the Merc claims to have a memo. If the rumors are true, Yahoo would be expected to pay many tens of millions of bucks to put its stamp on the ampitheatre. The cost of attaching a cporporate name to arenas has gone up quite a lot in recent years"}, {"response": 5, "author": "terry", "date": "Thu, Feb  7, 2036 (03:13)", "body": "Abbreviated LISR today, as I have to run to catch a plane. My real job is intruding on my fun for the rest of this week, so I'm afraid you'll have to live without LISR until next Monday, unless I can squeeze out a few update in between conference sessions (yuck). Market did absolutely nothing today, for once. Less than a percentage point moves in all the major indexes, with the techs slightly down and the industrials and S&P slightly up (although, its funny, when I wrote an earlier draft of this report, I had \"up\" and \"down\" in the reverse places!) We're basically treading water here. No news is good news, I guess. $_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$ Lycos continues to bleed, losing another 7%. Today, however, only took the independent portals with it: CNet, Go2Net, Infoseek are also down, but many other internet stocks are up, some of them quite well: Ameritrade was up 28% (!), DoubleClick was up 7%, Broadcat.com up 8% and Excite up 4% and Yahoo up 1%. DoubleClick can thank the Goldman Sachs technology conference for its jump today; in its appearance at that conference it announced it would break even in the year 2000. DoubleClick is also linked to this new Free PC venture, where you can get a Compaq PC for free in return for having ads on your desktop and having your movements tracked and sold to advertisers. What was up with Ameritrade? Probably a combination of two things. One could be called the Big Cojones Effect, if I may be so bold. Ameritrade was up in sympathy with another stock, which you'll learn about at the end of this report. The other reason could have been that E-trade, its main online competitor, has been socked with a class action lawsuit thanks to the outages it had last week. But there was no real news that I could find to cause Ameritrade to soar quite so much today. $_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$ Ford is rumored to be in talks to merge with BMW. This has absolutely nothing to do with the Internet, its just a juicy rumor I had to pass on. $_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$ Vertica Software, a tiny penny stock trading over the counter, has been getting a HUGE boost over the last few days. Did it account a web play? Did it make deal with Lucent? Did the day traders get ahold of it? None of these things. It just happened to have a pretty darn good stock symbol: VERT. There's an IPO coming up this week, a company called VerticalNet. VerticalNet is a Web IPO, specializing in \"business-to-business communities.\" Investors, assuming VerticalNet's stock symbol would be VERT (and perhaps there were reports to that effect, its not clear), have been placing orders in anticipation of the actual IPO, and surprise! buying shares in Vertica instead. And so Vertica's stock has gone WAY up in the last couple of days. The NASDAQ rules go that if an OTC stock has a symbol that a larger, listed company wants, the larger company gets it. This happened with Amazon as well -- Amazon the book company took over the AMZN stock symbol from Amazon Natural Treasures. So today, VerticalNet is indeed VERT (and is expected to open for real any day now after pricing last night at $12), and poor Vertica Software is now VERI, and is left to languish on the OTC boards. The moral of this story: If you must place market orders on stocks about to go IPO -- generally a bad idea in the first place -- at least know what the stock symbol is. $_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$ Big Cojones Award of the Day: Rushmore Financial (RFGI), a financial services company, announced a web site. Oh, but not just any web site. They picked a good one. RushTrade.com is designed specifically for day traders, and will provide online trading and level II market data (real-time quotes, effectively). Rushmore went public last may at 6, and has been trading around 2 since September. They are incredibly unprofitable. Yesterday they closed at 2 1/2ish. This morning, on the news, they opened at 5. The close? 11 3/4. One day gain of 422%. Rushmore financial. Rush More! AHAHAH! $_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$ Laura's Internet Stock Report is copyright 1999 (c) Laura Lemay lemay@lne.com Permission is Granted to forward the LISR in its entirety with this copyright intact."}, {"response": 6, "author": "stacey", "date": "Tue, Mar  2, 1999 (17:52)", "body": ""}, {"response": 7, "author": "terry", "date": "Thu, Mar  4, 1999 (08:22)", "body": "From today's LISR: $_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$ Go! Go! Go! Go! Go! Stop! Please! First there was Go2Net. Then there was Go.com. Now there's Go Call Inc (GOCA), a penny stock that does offshore casino gambling under the moniker gocasino.com. They've been doing quite well at that business, making actual money at it, so they decided to go into e-commerce and lose some of it instead (which will theoretically make them more of an internet stock play and pump up their stock price). Actually, they already are in e-commerce, sort of. They also run a banner ad clearinghouse (gobannerad.com), where you can sign up to have banner ads put on your pages and you get some cut of the profits. But what they're all excited about is a new site called Indexus.com, a shopper's search engine that will compare prices across different e-commerce sites (so you know you're getting the best price when you go shopping for books or CDs or whatever). Will that make money? Who knows. The announcement of it, however, pumped up the stock from below 1 to 6ish before it settled to the 2 1/2 its been trading at ever since. But 1 to 2 1/2 isn't that bad a gain, overall. $_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$_$ Laura's Internet Stock Report Daily (LISRD) is copyright (c) 1999 Laura Lemay lemay@lne.com all rights reserved. For more information, send mail to majordomo@lne.com with \"info\" in the body of the message or \"subscribe lisrd your-email\" to subscribe."}, {"response": 8, "author": "cfadm", "date": "Sat, Jul  1, 2006 (20:25)", "body": "Tried signing up, let's see if this is still around. internet conference Main Menu"}]}, {"num": 38, "subject": "Internet Explorer 5.0", "response_count": 24, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "wolf", "date": "Thu, Feb  7, 2036 (01:55)", "body": "somebody please help me! here's the scenario: i went to download IE 5 to replace my 4. the download took a long time and kept being interrupted. ok, so i go and try to install it (which automatically comes up everytime i turn on my computer) and it seems to have problems installing--telling me it was unsuccessful and to shut down and start over. no problem, only i've done it a zillion times and each time it's screwed up. so i decided to reinstall IE 4 to start over. that's unsuccessful too. now i get the following error messages: error loading IEDKCS32.DLL a device attached to the system is not functioning the LOADWC.EXE file is linked to missing export SHLWAPI.DLL:wnsprintfA so now (btw my server is through MSN), when i log in and go to my default start page (MSN.COM) i get a message asking me whether i want to save the default somewhere or open it up. no matter what i do, it tries to shut me down. i can't even use my IE browser at all. i have Netscape installed and it runs fine. i've tried junking IE and really starting over, but the uninstall has been unabled (i think this is the norm). i've gone and tried to redownload the software and this didn't work either. oh, an now windows explorer doesn't work either. i tried to reinstall msn but it didn't work (you have to log on and it's supposed to take you to setup.msn.com but that didn't work and i got the same error messages). HELP ME!! did i break it????"}, {"response": 2, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Thu, Feb  7, 2036 (03:21)", "body": "not sure...my first guess if I did that at home would be to re-install windows...not sure what to tell you to do, Wolfsie..."}, {"response": 3, "author": "ratthing", "date": "Thu, Feb  7, 2036 (05:25)", "body": "welcome to IE hell, wolfie. i've done something similar a few times, and ended up reinstalling winblows. you might try going to Start -> Settings -> Control Panel then double clicking on the \"Add/Remove Programs\" icon. if you see IE 5.0 there, or it's install program, try Removing it byclicking on its name then hitting the Add/Remove button. if that does the trick of bringing you back to square one, try installing IE 5.0 again. if it does not do the trick, or if there are no entries under Add/Remove, then get your WIndows CD out and run the Setup.exe program on the CD. this will re-install windows for you, and shouldnt delete anything of critical importance on the system. keep us posted!"}, {"response": 4, "author": "terry", "date": "Thu, Feb  7, 2036 (05:53)", "body": "Ray said it, I'm guessing there's no unintall for IE5 though and, if there were, I wouldn't count on this. Worth a try, though, before re-installing. When this happens to me, I rebuild everything from scratch. Do a backup! Before you mess around, though."}, {"response": 5, "author": "wolf", "date": "Thu, Feb  7, 2036 (03:58)", "body": "yeah. thanks guys *hugs* there is no uninstall for ie 4 and i doubt there's one for ie 5. ie 5 setup is all over the computer but can't get anywhere with it. i tried to download ie 5 again, but apparantly, the setup didn't work because i have a resume icon on my desktop. if i reinstall windows, will it mess up other programs already in place (i.e., quicken, etc.)? you guys are so patient, thanks a million!!!"}, {"response": 6, "author": "wolf", "date": "Thu, Feb  7, 2036 (05:47)", "body": "um, i redownloaded ie 5 and it downloaded and installed smoothly with no breaks in the transmission. everything works and i'm no longer getting error messages. thanks!!!!"}, {"response": 7, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Thu, Feb  7, 2036 (06:12)", "body": "yippeee!"}, {"response": 8, "author": "wolf", "date": "Tue, Apr  6, 1999 (22:38)", "body": "i know!!"}, {"response": 9, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Oct 29, 1999 (19:19)", "body": "None of this would have happened if you had downloaded and installed the stand-alone Netscape Navigator 4.0.8. Then you hand pick every last vestage of IE out of your files (after running the Uninstall function). Presto! Like magic you can see and post things never seeable or postable before. (ducking to avoid the shoes and rotten veggies sure to be hurled in my direction by disagreeing people I know and love...)"}, {"response": 10, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Oct 29, 1999 (19:23)", "body": "You can run an uninstall function from your control panel to delete most of IE - that is what I did and it works just fine."}, {"response": 11, "author": "terry", "date": "Fri, Oct 29, 1999 (20:57)", "body": "Or get a telnet account and be a true geek."}, {"response": 12, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Oct 29, 1999 (22:17)", "body": "I have one *smile* and have just downloaded crt from your buddy Don Stroud...but Pine sucks and Lynx is the pits...or do they improve under the influence of crt, as well?! Actually, I have a telnet account with my ISP and one with you at Spring! I cannot post very easily on Spring with the HOL telnet account...!"}, {"response": 13, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Oct 29, 1999 (22:19)", "body": "I felt truly geek-worthy yesterday when I managed to link two different conferences to Geo. It made my entire week...month, even..."}, {"response": 14, "author": "terry", "date": "Sat, Oct 30, 1999 (05:34)", "body": "Wonder why you can't post easily with HOL? Are you using pico as your editor in your telnet sessions?"}, {"response": 15, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Sat, Oct 30, 1999 (13:53)", "body": "So far I have not got into pico or vi, and am not sure I know where and when in the telnetting process that I do access them. I have downloaded all sorts of tutorials for vi so I could be helpful to a programmer around these parts but now on hiatus but have progressed to the point that I need someone much wiser than I am or a site more descriptive than I presently have found to nudge me in the right direction. Most of the posting problem was due to the way lynx got me into Spring. I could not find the ongin and password place at first, and with out them there is no posting. I should try again now that I am a little more experienced..."}, {"response": 16, "author": "terry", "date": "Sun, Oct 31, 1999 (11:17)", "body": "I think your default editor is vi."}, {"response": 17, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Nov  5, 1999 (15:53)", "body": "I am sure it is. And I have my handy command sheets at my side, but I need practice... And this is the way to get it. I have solved the double telnet problem...day by day I learn something and correct errors here and there, but I am nowhere as proficient as I need to be nor as confident as I should be to tackle serious tasks on Unix. First we crawl, then we stand up...Then we walk and lastly we RUN! I am about to stand up!"}, {"response": 18, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Nov  5, 1999 (15:58)", "body": "BTW, HOL was begun by Hams after Hurrican Iniki descimated the Island of Kauai. It has become the most successful and largest ISP in the islands from its humble telnet beginnings. When I first joined all I could get into was CERN in Europe (the parent of the Internet), and the card catalog at the U of Hawaii Manoa campus library! I hope they all got rich and took stock options in the business!"}, {"response": 19, "author": "terry", "date": "Sat, Nov  6, 1999 (11:53)", "body": "Wow, Marcia you're really an early adopter. You got in when telnet was still cool. What was that song, \"I was country, when country wasn't cool.\"?"}, {"response": 20, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Sat, Nov  6, 1999 (18:11)", "body": "Telnet was all there was!!! I cut my email teeth on Pine. It was survival. My son had gone away to school and I was bereft of my best hiking and talking buddy. He hauled me kicking and screaming into the cyber-world, and the rest is history. T can remember loading programs into a commodore 64 from a tape machine! They came on little cassettes and you loaded them, played or used them then removed them. Very odd."}, {"response": 21, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Sat, Nov  6, 1999 (18:21)", "body": "The really neat thing is HOL has continued to make that available to those who prefer to do things the old-fashioned way. They have Lynx as a browser, Pine for Email, Mirc for chat, ftp availability (very primitive), USENET for newsgroups, Archie, Ping, Whois, Finger, NSLookup (primitive search engine), and TraceRoute (?) You have not lived until you have tried to navigate the web that way..."}, {"response": 22, "author": "terry", "date": "Sat, Nov  6, 1999 (19:22)", "body": "Absolutely, those of us who got in early cut our teeth on these programs and then along came the tidal wave known as the web. But telnet takes you right to the soul of the machine, bypassing the glitz and glamor of the colorful images, so your only dealing with the words and thoughts. telnet is a vanishing species."}, {"response": 23, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Sat, Nov  6, 1999 (19:38)", "body": "I am pretty sure those who just use windows will never realize the marvel and intricacy that the Internet is and the computer is, as well. It is one of those things like the bumble bee, which should not be able to fly, but since the bee does not know this, he flies anyway. It is amazing how reliable the computer is (despite AOL's nefariousness and the impatience of the majority of users.) It is like being a pioneer again when you telnet...part of the universal continuum. I guess it is like that for Ham who use CW with the old-style paddles."}, {"response": 24, "author": "cfadm", "date": "Sat, Jul  1, 2006 (20:25)", "body": "We're up to IE 7 now. internet conference Main Menu"}]}, {"num": 39, "subject": "Free stuff on the Internet", "response_count": 16, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "terry", "date": "Mon, Jul 19, 1999 (10:53)", "body": "I found this site a little while by accident, I was searching for something else. So it may be hokey. No guarantees for recommendations, you might want to try it out and report back to this topic. My biggest freebie off the net so far has been a plastic frisbee from the American Plastics something or other. Anyway, the url you didn't know you were waiting for is here at last. Free stuff! Wow! http://rsg.simplenet.com/"}, {"response": 2, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Sat, Mar 25, 2000 (20:10)", "body": "From Lance in Geo: Guess what I found? An Internet provider that is free. Yes free. The only thing I have to do after signing up is to let a small, slightly annoying little screen play ads all the time. I found it in my e-mail from a company I was already signed with. It's called FreeLane, and it is thru excite.com. Using it now, and so far, nothing to complain about."}, {"response": 3, "author": "wolf", "date": "Tue, Apr  4, 2000 (20:39)", "body": "there's some other place that allows you to use their internet provider for free only the ads you have to put up with are always in the way and you can't minimize or close them. can't remember the name of it though."}, {"response": 4, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Tue, Apr  4, 2000 (20:46)", "body": "Free online gif tools - nothing to download. You take your buttons with ugly frames there and they will make them transparent. I knw, I did it with the buttons in Geo - all except the Help button which got the best treatment and I could not duplicate that anywhere else, myself. http://www.gifworks.com/cgi-bin/gifworks.pl?file_open"}, {"response": 5, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Tue, Apr  4, 2000 (20:47)", "body": ""}, {"response": 6, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Tue, Apr  4, 2000 (20:49)", "body": "There are several free internet servers available now, but Lance had problems with the one he tried - very slow and caused problems with other programs. I think he is back with his old ISP for a fee."}, {"response": 7, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Thu, Apr  6, 2000 (19:41)", "body": "Here's another free internet connection http://freelane.excite.com/"}, {"response": 8, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Sat, Apr  8, 2000 (19:41)", "body": "This is for a free PC to PC phone service \"Call PC to PC, anytime, anywhere, for free.\" as they put it: http://phonefree.com/"}, {"response": 9, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Sat, Apr  8, 2000 (19:51)", "body": "altavista.com did a \"free stuff\" search for me and came up with this first page: Free Stuff Central (TM) -=- Your Complete Source For Free Stuff Tons of free stuff including clip art, screen savers, software, webmasters resources, contests, and more!... URL: www.freestuffcentral.com/ Last modified on: 3-Feb-2000 - 13K bytes - in English [ Translate ] [ Related pages ] 2. 1freesite.com - A collection of free stuff for you! Free stuff and free offers for you! Win Cash, Vacations, get magazines, catalogs and other free offers!... URL: www.1freesite.com/ Last modified on: 2-Feb-2000 - 24K bytes - in English [ Translate ] [ Related pages ] 3. www.4Free.net - Free Stuff and Freebies. Updated daily. Featured free offers. Free Stuff, Banner Exchanges, Free Guestbooks, Free Catalogs, Free Sweepstakes, Free Software, Win a Trip, Free Magazines, Free Books, Free URL... URL: www.4free.net/ Last modified on: 3-Feb-2000 - 29K bytes - in English [ Translate ] [ Related pages ] 4. Totally Free Stuff! Totally FREE and fun stuff available through our site!... URL: www.freeandfun.com/ Last modified on: 12-Feb-2000 - 9K bytes - in English [ Translate ] [ More pages from this site ] [ Related pages ] 5. Free Stuff Search! - By Total Free Stuff .Com The most comprehensive searchable listing of free stuff that can be found on the web.... URL: www.freestuffsearch.com/ Last modified on: 22-Oct-1999 - 22K bytes - in English [ Translate ] [ Related pages ] 6. Sexy Women Celebrities - Free Stuff - Gossip - Celebrity Screen Savers and The Sexy Women Celebrities - Celebrities / Movie Stars / Actors / Movies / Gossip / Chat... URL: www.kcweb.com/super/s_main.htm Last modified on: 13-Mar-2000 - 20K bytes - in English [ Translate ] [ More pages from this site ] [ Related pages ] 7. hair loss treatments + HAIRLOSS FREE STUFF + Hair Loss Products Treatments Fre hair loss treatments products 'free stuff trial of '713' HAIRLOSS TREATMENTS,#1 priced organic DHT Hair Loss Products Treatments baldness cure.... URL: www.multiflora.co.uk/ Last modified on: 7-Feb-2000 - 21K bytes - in English [ Translate ] [ More pages from this site ] [ Related pages ] 8. free,free fonts,freeware,free stuff,shareware,fonts,cool,dingbats,mac,Acid Fon Acid Fonts - Huge free archive of pc and mac fonts free for download... URL: www.acidcool.com/ Last modified on: 15-Mar-2000 - 18K bytes - in English [ Translate ] [ More pages from this site ] [ Related pages ] 9. FREE Vault: YOUR Complete FREE Stuff Directory! UPDATED DAILY! FREE Vault: YOUR Complete FREE Stuff Directory! Your search begins and ends here for everything FREE! All resources are reviewed and rated for your... URL: www.freevault.com/ Last modified on: 2-Feb-2000 - 27K bytes - in English [ Translate ] [ Related pages ] 10. No Junk Free Stuff We are different from other free sites in that we do not list any type of junky free stuff. You will only find the best freebies here.... URL: www.nojunkfree.com/ Last modified on: 30-Jan-2000 - 21K bytes - in English [ Translate ] [ More pages from this site ] [ Related pages ] Result Pages: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 [Next] word count: free stuff: 967519"}, {"response": 10, "author": "sociolingo", "date": "Mon, Apr 10, 2000 (05:00)", "body": "IMHO most of the free stuff doesn't do Europe. At least the ones I looked at. For UK folk try LineOne.net as ISP. I now get free, no phone charges, internet access from them 24 hrs 7 days a week. I have to pay \ufffd5 a month internationl/national rate phone calls(it get debited automatically), and my line rental is still from BT as usual. Speed wise it was slow on the first day, but now seems much the same as my earlier provider."}, {"response": 11, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Mon, Apr 10, 2000 (13:25)", "body": "Good point, Maggie. What works for one country's phone system might be inappropriate for the rest or not even workable."}, {"response": 12, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Sun, Apr 16, 2000 (22:15)", "body": "This is as it says (and I have no idea what is being offered here...) Check out the free stuff: http://www.GotitFree.com"}, {"response": 13, "author": "sprin5", "date": "Mon, Apr 17, 2000 (10:08)", "body": "Careful about free stuff, though, it could lead to an abundance of free junk email."}, {"response": 14, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Mon, Apr 17, 2000 (12:37)", "body": "I just look at the offers of free stuff, I have discovered why it is not nexessarily a \"Good Thing\" to sign up for it. Lots of little hangers-on show up in yor email, you are right!"}, {"response": 15, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Tue, May  9, 2000 (15:54)", "body": "Internet Hoax -- Free CDs, or Not CDs This e-mail chain letter states that if you forward the e-mail to enough friends you will get ten free CDs courtesy of Columbia House via Cyberpromotions. The more friends you send the e-mail to, the more free CDs you will get in the mail. Nice, huh? Too bad it's not true. As a matter of fact, Cyberpromotions has several lawsuits against them from AOL, Earthlink and CompuServe for spamming. An example of one of these suits is at http://ftp.ntua.gr/spam/news/compuserve.html"}, {"response": 16, "author": "cfadm", "date": "Sat, Jul  1, 2006 (20:25)", "body": "COLUMBUS, Ohio, May 6 /PRNewswire/ -- CompuServe (Nasdaq: CSRV) and Cyber Promotions, through a consent agreement, will petition the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Ohio to enter an order accepting that consent agreement. The order would prohibit Cyber Promotions from sending any unsolicited e-mail to CompuServe subscribers. The order would also require Cyber Promotions to prohibit any of its customers from sending unsolicited e-mail to CompuServe subscribers. Violators will be disclosed to CompuServe and could have their accounts with Cyber Promotions canceled and face possible legal action by CompuServe. Cyber Promotions will also pay $65,000 to CompuServe for legal fees incurred in obtaining the order and will also be liable for pre-determined damages to CompuServe if Cyber Promotions violates the order. Furthermore, CompuServe members who choose to receive e-mail from Cyber Promotions will do so under controlled procedures designed to ensure that only those subscribers who ask to receiv Cyber Promotions' messages will receive them. Cyber Promotions will be permitted to purchase advertising on CompuServe describing its commercial message service to CompuServe subscribers. Such purchases may be used to partially offset Cyber Promotions payment of CompuServe's legal fees. internet conference Main Menu"}]}, {"num": 4, "subject": "Dumb and stupid internet questions - the place to ask", "response_count": 45, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "krisg", "date": "Wed, Feb  5, 1997 (20:00)", "body": "I have both Internet Explorer 3.0 version and Netscape 3.0 version browser on my windows disc. Netscape is a default browser. But anytime I download from netscape, the file attaches to Microsfot file, and when I Open the dowloaded file, the explorer browser opens, asking if I want to change the default browser, and I have stated no, but now the downloaded file is still attached to microsoft logo. What can I do to correct this. Thank you for your assistance."}, {"response": 2, "author": "folkartist", "date": "Mon, Feb 17, 1997 (19:46)", "body": "I would like to know how to put a homepage up on the internet. I found the Spring while doing some research. I don't even know how to get the answer to the question I am asking except to tell you that I have an email address with the Spring which is folkartist@204.211.35.25 and another email at folkartist@hotmail.com and I know how to retrieve a message there. Can you help me, Terry?"}, {"response": 3, "author": "terry", "date": "Wed, Feb 19, 1997 (04:26)", "body": "First, that's not really a spring email address. That's the default that the system trieds to guess when you don't enter your actual email address. And regular contributors to the conferences get their home pages listed. What kind of stuff did you want to have on a home page?"}, {"response": 4, "author": "boswell", "date": "Sat, Mar 14, 1998 (02:46)", "body": "Why is it, that even after we have so many useless and worthless virtual communities as it is, someone like terry has to go ahead and start yet another one up? Maybe he's trying to outdo the worst--and at that, he is definitely succeeding."}, {"response": 5, "author": "terry", "date": "Sat, Mar 14, 1998 (04:05)", "body": "Welcome boswell, so good to hear someone take a counterpoint. We tend to be self congratulatory around here. But I don't think we take ourselves that seriously, the only measure is whether the folks here have a good time, and they seem to be doing that. And you're about four years too late."}, {"response": 6, "author": "orange", "date": "Sat, Mar 14, 1998 (15:46)", "body": "it has a similar odor/scratch that fragrance but i havent seen that capitalization scheme. and terry, i seem to recall the emails are not verified on registration at spring? more likely maj. hi maj!!!"}, {"response": 8, "author": "terry", "date": "Mon, Mar 16, 1998 (11:32)", "body": "I have been in communication with the real Gerard Van Der Leun this morning. The above post is a fake. We have a means of finding out who the imposter may be."}, {"response": 9, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Thu, Jun 10, 1999 (12:58)", "body": "What does HCI stand for?"}, {"response": 10, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Thu, Jun 10, 1999 (13:19)", "body": "It's \"ich\" spelled backwards. \"Ich\" = \"I\" in German. Not the answer your looking for, huh?"}, {"response": 11, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Thu, Jun 10, 1999 (13:23)", "body": "How about this: \"Human-Computer Interaction is a field of ergonomics concerned with the design of computer technologies. The goal of HCI is \"Getting users interacting with computers to perform effective work.\" (Long). Found it using the search tool on the main menu. More here: http://www.ergohci.ucl.ac.uk/"}, {"response": 12, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Thu, Jun 10, 1999 (15:48)", "body": "THAT would be the correct answer! thanks!"}, {"response": 13, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Sat, Jun 12, 1999 (06:30)", "body": "There's also a phone company in the US called HCI..."}, {"response": 14, "author": "stacey", "date": "Tue, Jun 15, 1999 (15:04)", "body": "heard of MCI... never heard of HCI... (am i walking into a trap or WHAT?)"}, {"response": 15, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Tue, Jun 15, 1999 (15:22)", "body": "depends on if you can define the difference between internet, intranet, and extranet..."}, {"response": 16, "author": "stacey", "date": "Tue, Jun 15, 1999 (16:46)", "body": "exe"}, {"response": 17, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Tue, Jun 15, 1999 (16:54)", "body": "mouse"}, {"response": 18, "author": "stacey", "date": "Tue, Jun 15, 1999 (17:11)", "body": "cat and?"}, {"response": 19, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Wed, Jun 16, 1999 (03:57)", "body": "Ball of yarn."}, {"response": 20, "author": "stacey", "date": "Wed, Jun 16, 1999 (10:28)", "body": "grandma perkins"}, {"response": 21, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Wed, Jun 16, 1999 (17:06)", "body": "Perkins, Perkins - is she Carl Perkins granny?"}, {"response": 22, "author": "stacey", "date": "Thu, Jun 17, 1999 (10:43)", "body": "could be... she's not my granny"}, {"response": 23, "author": "casanova", "date": "Sun, Jul 11, 1999 (11:07)", "body": "is there any server in the toronto called spring it works like aol"}, {"response": 24, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Sun, Jul 11, 1999 (11:30)", "body": "hmmm..."}, {"response": 25, "author": "sociolingo", "date": "Sat, Feb  5, 2000 (11:46)", "body": "I've just switched from IE5 to Netscape. Is there any way I can import my 'favourites' to the bookmarks of Netscape without having to select each and every file. Can I import a folder somewhere? I'm getting desperate."}, {"response": 26, "author": "sprin5", "date": "Sat, Feb  5, 2000 (12:56)", "body": "You can sign up for Visto on http://www.spring.net and it will store your booksmarks on their website via an import mechism, then load them in to your other browser. That's what I use to share bookmarks between browsers and it works great. Just click the banner on http://www.spring.net that says visto and it will tell you how to do it after you sign up."}, {"response": 27, "author": "sociolingo", "date": "Sun, Feb  6, 2000 (04:02)", "body": "Thanks, I was getting quite desperate."}, {"response": 28, "author": "sprin5", "date": "Sun, Feb  6, 2000 (07:32)", "body": "Let me know about your progress on this, ok? I can share more advice on using Visto if you need it. Were you able to sign up ok?"}, {"response": 29, "author": "sociolingo", "date": "Sun, Feb  6, 2000 (14:42)", "body": "Sign up was fine. I've transferred over a few files and that's OK too. I downloaded the sync assistant but it didn't like me very much and insisted I shut my browser, and still didn't like me after I did. It also didn't seem to recognise I had IE5 as well as Netscape. Ideas?"}, {"response": 30, "author": "sprin5", "date": "Sun, Feb  6, 2000 (16:15)", "body": "You're going to have to set change your default browser most likely and tell Visto in preferences which browswer to import/export bookmarks to/from."}, {"response": 31, "author": "sociolingo", "date": "Sun, Feb  6, 2000 (17:52)", "body": "I have just found another solution tonight. I found a site called my bookmark http://www.mybookmarks.com I can download all my bookmarks into that in their present folders and access them via netscape or IE5. I'm trying it out."}, {"response": 32, "author": "sprin5", "date": "Sun, Feb  6, 2000 (19:56)", "body": "You can do the same with Visto, they keep your bookmarks on their website and you can access them there."}, {"response": 33, "author": "sociolingo", "date": "Mon, Feb  7, 2000 (14:00)", "body": "I found it difficult to transfer them in folders. I use visto for file storage but also found it difficult to store files using my present folder system, so I only stored the vital ones. (I've got zip backup too)"}, {"response": 34, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Thu, Feb 10, 2000 (16:13)", "body": "(You do,eh?)"}, {"response": 35, "author": "sociolingo", "date": "Fri, Feb 11, 2000 (14:40)", "body": "(Yes I have, so you can stop worrying about me :-)"}, {"response": 36, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Fri, Feb 11, 2000 (17:54)", "body": "(You use Zip Rescue yet? Like, create a rescue zip, so you can restart your machine if it ever crashes? Great tool! Downloadable from Iomega.com!)"}, {"response": 37, "author": "sociolingo", "date": "Sat, Feb 12, 2000 (13:58)", "body": "(Yeah, I got the tools disk with the machine. so far I haven't had to do a rescue since I got the zip drive. What do you know about 'click of death'? Should we switch this conversation to 'computers' somewhere or is it OK to talk here?)"}, {"response": 38, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Fri, Feb 18, 2000 (16:49)", "body": "(Who wants to sue us? But ok, pick a better topic, and tell me. I *HAD* Click of Death last year. I know all you can find in the WWW.)"}, {"response": 39, "author": "sociolingo", "date": "Fri, Feb 18, 2000 (17:29)", "body": "I guess since no-one's complaining we can carry on! Can you email the URLs of what you found? I haven't experienced it yet - but I must admit to waking up dreading it!!!! I've got a double zip back up of my data just in case - plus visto. It's at the point now where it wuld be very difficult to repeat if it all got scrambled. I still have printer problems with the zip - I'm using parallel and route the printer through the zip. Usually I just have to clear the connection once by trying to print something and then clearing it. I find that easier than the official solution which is much more involved. However, recently I found the zip drive kept removing itself when I closed down and I've had to reinstall it severaL times. It's behaving itself today, so perhaps I've done something right."}, {"response": 40, "author": "sociolingo", "date": "Tue, Apr 18, 2000 (05:16)", "body": "Not quite an internet question - but a wierd thing happened today. My modem when dialling my ISP rang the emergency services - we got a call from the police once i got off the phone line saying they'd received a silent call from us!!! Cannot figure how it happened. If it keeps happening I'm in trouble!!!! I cannot figure how my modem configured to dail only my ISP rang the emergency services - they traced the call to my landline. Ideas?"}, {"response": 41, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Tue, Apr 18, 2000 (14:12)", "body": "All I can think of is to check and double check the phone number you entered in your dial-up program and make sure it is the ISP and not one of the emergency services. Should they be the same, you need to contact your ISP tech staff and tell them about it."}, {"response": 42, "author": "sociolingo", "date": "Wed, Apr 19, 2000 (12:48)", "body": "Happened again today. wierd or what. doesn't happen every time, double checks done. Must be something to do with the intermediary phone provider (we have a smart box attached to the main phone line to divert national and international calls to them). Have sent an urgent email. Police are being very nice about it, and they tried to contact our provider for us, but only us are allowed to report it."}, {"response": 43, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Wed, Apr 19, 2000 (15:08)", "body": "There should be some national (like our FCC) organization which could bring out the big guns to make the ISP fix the problem ASAP. Tough time coming. I am sick of shredding my stuff for him. Gave him an ultimatum to find elsewhere to live or live with it."}, {"response": 44, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Mon, Apr 24, 2000 (06:40)", "body": "Perhaps somebody changed the number in the dial-up settings to make using the modem more, ah, interesting? As in a prank? What operating system do you use?"}, {"response": 45, "author": "sociolingo", "date": "Thu, Apr 27, 2000 (14:04)", "body": "Win 98. I seem to have solvd it for now by removing the 'Quip' smart box. I think the problem is likely to have been that with so much traffic on the ine and the difficulties of getting through it's only dialing part of the Quip prefix number (1250),and therefore getting 112 sometimes. It's the only explanation I can think of, and expecially since it's now stopped. I'm loath to reconnect the quip box while the ISP is still settling down to the masses of new subscribers folling the free phone calls to the net offer (which is why i joined them!). Once it looks like they can carry the load easier, I'll try again and see if we get the same problem. Trouble I is don't know how many 'nuisance calls' to the emergency services you are allowed before you get charged with an offense. So I'm scared."}, {"response": 46, "author": "cfadm", "date": "Wed, Jun 28, 2006 (15:07)", "body": "We're back. And we're beautiful. internet conference Main Menu"}]}, {"num": 40, "subject": "bloki", "response_count": 6, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "stacey", "date": "Wed, Apr 23, 2003 (22:28)", "body": "neat. Have you tried it yet Paul?"}, {"response": 2, "author": "terry", "date": "Wed, Apr 23, 2003 (22:53)", "body": "Yeah, I set up some experimental sites, one is at http://terry.bloki.com"}, {"response": 3, "author": "stacey", "date": "Wed, Apr 23, 2003 (23:21)", "body": "Very nice! Did you format yourself or are you required to use a template? I just signed up and will play when I get confirmation! BTW, I really like the abalone interface. But how come I can't access inner from there?"}, {"response": 4, "author": "terry", "date": "Fri, Apr 25, 2003 (10:20)", "body": "I'm not sure, I'll look in to that. I'll ask Jan."}, {"response": 5, "author": "admin", "date": "Thu, Feb 12, 2004 (14:43)", "body": "Have you played, Stace?"}, {"response": 6, "author": "cfadm", "date": "Sat, Jul  1, 2006 (20:26)", "body": "Amazing http://terry.bloki.com is still there and I haven't thought about it in over a year. internet conference Main Menu"}]}, {"num": 41, "subject": "austin.com - the domain name stolen from spring.net", "response_count": 3, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "KarenR", "date": "Sun, Dec 19, 2004 (11:10)", "body": "Ten years later this is coming up? Had you acted on it in a timely manner you might've had some recourse. But 10 years? I doubt it. There are paper trails for payments for the domain name. But you haven't been paying for the domain name for the past 10 years and obviously need to keep better records. With the O'Reilly book and your payment record (which always exist in some form somewhere), you would have a case. Naturally, this is a lawsuit and I wouldn't take Network Solutions' word. Go to a lawyer. You can bring suit against not only the two men but Network Solutions. It should make no difference if the two men had root access to your server for a domain to be transferred out of your ownership. That has no bearing. If the two men had posed as you, that was fraud. Any lawyer will tell you that."}, {"response": 2, "author": "terry", "date": "Tue, Dec 21, 2004 (04:23)", "body": "What did did was clearly fraudulent. But proving it would be difficult. My only hope is that they'll wake up and admit their wrongdoing. If they have a conscience. We'll see. George and Bob may have a sliver of humanity in them, maybe they'll seek it out."}, {"response": 3, "author": "cfadm", "date": "Sat, Jul  1, 2006 (20:28)", "body": "Should say, what \"they\" did. They never fessed up. Registrant: Real/Time Communications 822 Brentwood St. Austin, TEXAS 78757 US Domain Name: AUSTIN.COM Administrative Contact, Technical Contact: RealTime Communications gustwick@realtime.net BOX 2966867 Sioux Falls, SD 57186 US 512-451-0046 fax: 512-459-3858 Record expires on 04-Mar-2014. Record created on 03-Mar-1994. Database last updated on 1-Jul-2006 20:27:24 EDT. Domain servers in listed order: NS.REALTIME.NET 205.238.128.39 NS2.REALTIME.NET 205.238.128.42 Gustwick still owns the name he stole from me. internet conference Main Menu"}]}, {"num": 42, "subject": "Venture Capital", "response_count": 2, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "terry", "date": "Thu, Jan 27, 2005 (04:00)", "body": "Mercora and Habbo Hotel illustrate what's happening at both ends of the funding pipeline for start-ups: Money is flowing again not only into survivors of the dot-com boom (Finland-based Habbo Hotel started in 2000) but also to a promising generation of newcomers hoping to grow up and become the next eBay, Yahoo or Google. \"We are seeing a real upswing in the number of really interesting new start-up ideas out there,\" said James R. Lussier, a member of the investment team at Norwest Venture Partners, which doubled its dealmaking activity last year compared with 2003. \"We are looking at investment opportunities now that will be significant companies three to five years out.\" http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A40194-2005Jan26.html"}, {"response": 2, "author": "cfadm", "date": "Sat, Jul  1, 2006 (20:29)", "body": "That's us and the slides sites. See http://web2.0slides.com and http://tagslides.com the newest ventures. internet conference Main Menu"}]}, {"num": 43, "subject": "Internet Phone and Voice over ip (VOIP)", "response_count": 3, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "terry", "date": "Thu, Jan 27, 2005 (03:58)", "body": "When Kevin Cocco's friends in Montreal want to chat, they dial a local Quebec phone number - but it rings 2,300 miles away in his Utah home. http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/technology/2005-01-26-managing-tech-usat_x.htm"}, {"response": 2, "author": "terry", "date": "Sun, Apr 23, 2006 (19:02)", "body": "This is sort of indirectly related to this topic, I just couldn't think of another place to post it. Jingle Networks, which runs a free 411 service called 1-800-Free411, has raised $26 million in a Series B financing. The round was led by existing investor Liberty Associated Partners. Also participating were existing investors First Round Capital and IDG Ventures Boston, as well as new investor Comcast Interactive Capital. Our earlier profile of Free411 is here. The service is a free alternative to $1-$2 directory calls. The catch? You have to listen to a 12 second advertisement. It works mostly like normal directory assistance. You dial their phone number and go through an automated system that asks for the location, type of listing and listing name. While you are waiting for the number, you must listen to a 12 second advertisement from a competitor to the service. If you choose to use the competitor instead, you simply dial \ufffd1? to redirect your call. Another difference is that if there is no local advertiser for the business type you have requested, the business receiving the call hears a short message at the beginning of the call telling them that the call is via Free-411. A tele-sales group follows up with the business to try to get them to advertise. Free-411 claims a 13% success rate in converting businesses to advertisers. And they are seeing explosive growth. Free411 is now handling 7 million calls per month - out of a total of 500 million directory assistance calls per month in the U.S. That\ufffds about 1.5% of the total market. Investor Josh Kopelman from First Round Capital has another way of looking at it: \ufffd1-800-FREE411 has the potential to shrink an $8 billion market.\ufffd 1 800 free411 is also 1-800-377-3411 Pretty clever!"}, {"response": 3, "author": "cfadm", "date": "Sat, Jul  1, 2006 (20:29)", "body": "Skype has been crashing my system and hogging resources when I use it. So I've put it aside for now. internet conference Main Menu"}]}, {"num": 44, "subject": "twitter", "response_count": 5, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "cfadm", "date": "Sat, Mar 17, 2007 (18:44)", "body": "My twitter name is \"springnet\" I have 751 friends 132 followers and 181 updates (not sure yet what these are)"}, {"response": 2, "author": "cfadm", "date": "Sat, Mar 17, 2007 (19:17)", "body": "http://del.icio.us/springnet/twitter/"}, {"response": 3, "author": "cfadm", "date": "Sat, Mar 17, 2007 (19:24)", "body": "A must read website for new twitterers. http://twitter.pbwiki.com/ Scott Beale: SXSW 2007 Twittermob & Spontaneous Microsponsorships - Twittering for \"accidental\" event sponsors Chris Heuer: Beyond IM - Welcome to the EM era - Everywhere Messaging has arrived Kim M. Bayne: 48 Hours in Twitterland - pondering potential business applications Chris Heuer: Is SXSW going to be the death of Twitter? - Twitter is peaking, humans don't scale Ross Mayfield: Twitter Tips the Tuna - Twitter has peaked Anil Dash: Consider Twitter - Twitter's appeal Kathy Sierra: The Asymptotic Twitter Curve - coining the phrase \"nano-posts\" B.L. Ochman: Twitter Attracting Entertainment and Business - Twitter trends Scott Jangro: Why I hate Twitter - The basic concept is nothing new John Tropea: Twitter Tips & Tricks - if you leave IM updates on, you can get lots of updates Eric Meyer: The Twitters - it\ufffds rapidly becoming the most inefficient and unusable version of IRC ever Meg Pickard: Musings on Twitter - Different people use it in very different ways Rick Rey: To Twitter or not to Twitter - I\ufffdd like to share with you my experiences as a user \ufffd both good and bad C.Policaro: Twitter or the neverending present continous - An Italian post on the neverending present continous of Twitter"}, {"response": 4, "author": "paul", "date": "Sat, Mar 31, 2007 (04:25)", "body": "twitter is now experiencing \"unbridled growth\" according to Omar Gallaga who heard this from one of the folks who started twitter. There are new apps and mashups emerging daily like http://twittervision.com and various plugins for the Mac, XP and Vista."}, {"response": 5, "author": "cfadm", "date": "Fri, Apr 13, 2007 (23:23)", "body": "Several articles and new twitter links: http://del.icio.us/springnet/twitter/ internet conference Main Menu"}]}, {"num": 5, "subject": "email", "response_count": 5, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "Ann", "date": "Mon, Feb 22, 1999 (05:25)", "body": "I'm actually having trouble with my Spring e-mail address. I've been using the e-mail address from my ISP for most things, but that is dying at the end of the month, and I need to figure out how to use my www.spring.net address fully. I have no trouble collecting things from my mailbox, but I don't seem to be able to send any mail using that address. I'm using Netscape 3.0's Mail program. I have it set: Outgoing Mail (SMTP) Server = www.spring.net Incoming Mail (POP3) Server = anneh@www.spring.net POP3 Username = anneh@www.spring.net (Those work to receive mail, but not to send it--are they right?) --- My mail is bouncing back with this message: ---- Subject: Returned mail: Service unavailable Date: Sun, 21 Feb 1999 22:56:36 -0600 (CST) From: Mail Delivery Subsystem {MAILER-DAEMON} To: {anneh@www.spring.net} The original message was received at Sun, 21 Feb 1999 22:56:29 -0600 (CST) from min-mn3-17.ix.netcom.com [204.30.69.113] ----- The following addresses had permanent fatal errors ----- {dwguild@yahoo.com} ----- Transcript of session follows ----- 554 {dwguild@yahoo.com}... relay traffic prohibited 554 {dwguild@yahoo.com}... Service unavailable Reporting-MTA: dns; www.spring.net Received-From-MTA: DNS; min-mn3-17.ix.netcom.com Arrival-Date: Sun, 21 Feb 1999 22:56:29 -0600 (CST) Final-Recipient: RFC822; dwguild@yahoo.com Action: failed Status: 5.5.0 Remote-MTA: DNS; min-mn3-17.ix.netcom.com Last-Attempt-Date: Sun, 21 Feb 1999 22:56:35 -0600 (CST) Return-Path: anneh@www.spring.net Received: from LOCALNAME (min-mn3-17.ix.netcom.com [204.30.69.113]) by www.spring.net (8.8.5/8.7.3) with SMTP id WAA27568 for {dwguild@yahoo.com}; Sun, 21 Feb 1999 22:56:29 -0600 (CST) Message-ID: {36D0FD4D.67FD@www.spring.net} Date: Sun, 21 Feb 1999 22:46:37 -0800 From: \"Ann\" {anneh@www.spring.net} Reply-To: anneh@www.spring.net X-Mailer: Mozilla 3.0 (Win16; U) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: dwguild@yahoo.com Subject: test Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit"}, {"response": 2, "author": "ratthing", "date": "Mon, Feb 22, 1999 (05:51)", "body": "anne, is your email address here anneh@www.spring.net?? if so, then just from eyeballing your info above, you need to enter www.spring.net for both the POP3 and SMTP server name. also, your username for the POP3 server will be just anneh and not anneh@www.spring.net. give it a shot and let us know if it works."}, {"response": 3, "author": "Ann", "date": "Mon, Feb 22, 1999 (16:28)", "body": "Nope! It bounced back at me again (I can still get mail, I just can't send it). My settings are now (yes my e-mail address is anneh@www.spring.net): Outgoing Mail (SMTP) Server = www.spring.net Incoming Mail (POP3) Server = www.spring.net POP3 Username = anneh ---------------- Here's the Mailer-Daemon message: Subject: Returned mail: Service unavailable Date: Mon, 22 Feb 1999 10:19:14 -0600 (CST) From: Mail Delivery Subsystem {MAILER-DAEMON} To: anneh@www.spring.net The original message was received at Mon, 22 Feb 1999 10:18:05 -0600 (CST) from min-mn18-20.ix.netcom.com [205.186.81.244] ----- The following addresses had permanent fatal errors ----- {dwguild@yahoo.com} ----- Transcript of session follows ----- 554 {dwguild@yahoo.com}... relay traffic prohibited 554 {dwguild@yahoo.com}... Service unavailable Reporting-MTA: dns; www.spring.net Received-From-MTA: DNS; min-mn18-20.ix.netcom.com Arrival-Date: Mon, 22 Feb 1999 10:18:05 -0600 (CST) Final-Recipient: RFC822; dwguild@yahoo.com Action: failed Status: 5.5.0 Remote-MTA: DNS; min-mn18-20.ix.netcom.com Last-Attempt-Date: Mon, 22 Feb 1999 10:19:14 -0600 (CST) Return-Path: anneh@www.spring.net Received: from LOCALNAME (min-mn18-20.ix.netcom.com [205.186.81.244]) by www.spring.net (8.8.5/8.7.3) with SMTP id KAA25487 for {dwguild@yahoo.com}; Mon, 22 Feb 1999 10:18:05 -0600 (CST) Message-ID: {36D19CF7.7397@www.spring.net} Date: Mon, 22 Feb 1999 10:07:51 -0800 From: \"Ann \" {anneh@www.spring.net} Reply-To: anneh@www.spring.net X-Mailer: Mozilla 3.0 (Win16; U) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: dwguild@yahoo.com Subject: testing Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit"}, {"response": 4, "author": "ratthing", "date": "Mon, Feb 22, 1999 (20:41)", "body": "anneh, let me get with terry on this. i think we need to set up a different mail account for you, and i need to ask him which servers do what jobs. a problem with outgoing mail means that your SMTP server is not set correctly, and i may have to go in and create a new account for you on the spring's mail server(s)."}, {"response": 5, "author": "Ann", "date": "Mon, Feb 22, 1999 (22:37)", "body": "Thanks, Ray! (I do have a backup mail account with Yahoo, but I'd like to get this worked out.) internet conference Main Menu"}]}, {"num": 6, "subject": "PPP - how to connect to your internet provider by modem", "response_count": 0, "posts": []}, {"num": 7, "subject": "domain names - how to research and how to register", "response_count": 5, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "terry", "date": "Sun, Sep 22, 1996 (15:37)", "body": "http://www.webweek.com/96Sep09/industry/domains.html is an article from WebWeek on the upcoming new top-level domain registries."}, {"response": 2, "author": "terry", "date": "Sun, Dec 15, 1996 (01:48)", "body": "Sender: owner-nettime-l@Desk.nl Mime-Version: 1.0 Date: Fri, 29 Nov 1996 02:52:27 -0500 To: nettime-l@desk.nl, list@rhizome.com From: mf@MediaFilter.org (MediaFilter) Subject: nettime: Expanding the Internet Namespace Sender: owner-nettime-l@Desk.nl Precedence: bulk Expanding the Internet Namespace The overcrowding of the \"com.\" domain on the internet has led to much speculation, name piracy, ransom and blackmail. From pirates who registered McDonalds.com to blackmailers who hijacked Tiger Woods and snatched up \"tigerwoods.com\" then attempted to ransom it back to Mr. Woods...by insisting on creating and hosting his website! The current Domain Name System is an arcane and obsolete legacy of the cold war, when the identity and purpose of a network was reflected in its name. Now that the internet has commercialized, the nature of the Domain Name System has reached its limits and can no longer sustain the demands of commercial and personal users. The arbitrary designation of \"com\" has created the problem of how a company can express its identity by their network address. IBM, Inc. becomes IBM.com....that's fine when there is only one \"Big Blue\", but what happens when companies in other states or countries (the net is international!) have similar names? If Widgets, Inc., Widgets, Ltd., Widgets Bros., or Widgets Corp. had to face this today, only one of them could prevail under the current system.... and whomever was first to register 'widgets.com\" would hold the prized net address. Now, thanks to Media Artist Paul Garrin, and an international network of artists and friendly hackers, all of the names can be had....widgets.inc, widgets.ltd, widgets.bros and widgets.corp are all possible under a new internet address naming scheme Garrin calls \"name.space\". His new company, Name.Space, Inc. has put in place a network of root nameserver computers in several countries throughout Europe, with it's home base in the USA. Name.Space is the new competition for the newly privatized and de-facto monopoly on Domain Name Service now held by Network Solutions, Inc. of Herndon, Va. Network Solutions, Inc. was granted the contract to run the InterNIC (Internet Network Information Center) which was formerly run by the National Science Foundation (NSF) who, as a US taxpayer supported entity, registered domain names for free on a first come, first served basis. Since NSI took over InterNIC, they began charging $100 per name for new registrations, which recently hit a high of 50,000 per month, richly lining the pockets of this de-facto monopoly that dominates the deregulated internet marketplace. Although privatization should have upgraded the InterNIC to a free-market business, it has instead continued the bureaucratic nature of its predecessors--and not surprisingly-- for NSI, although on the surface is a private comapny, their ties to inside the D.C. beltway are apparent. The parent company of NSI, Scientific Applications International Corp. (SAIC) is a $2billion employee-owned company of about 20,000 with offices located internationally. SAIC is the number one private consulting firm to the Pentagon, NSA and CIA, and were responsible for the strategy of c3i (Command, Control, Communications, Intelligence) in the Gulf War. In 1995, SAIC (spelled backwards reads \"CIAs\") billed and collected $975 million from the Pentagon alone. SAIC bought NSI in March, 1995--just weeks before the NSI announced the intention to charge for domain names, which until then was a free process, paid for by US tax dollars. Registering a name with NSI can be painful and delayed... and the request for new top level domains is a long, painful process with no guarantees. Enter the free market.... Companies such as Name.Space. are now offering new top level domains, or rootnames, on demand. Registrations take place over an automated web interface which upon completion, renders the newly registered names active immediately. Users have the option of having unpublished addresses (much like unpublished phone numbers), an option that InterNIC/NSI/SAIC does not allow. Garrin's new scheme all but puts the name \"prospectors\" out of business. He suggests dozens of new possible domain names, and even invites you to think of your own. As Paul Garrin stated, \"The InterNIC/NSI command economy of artificial shortages has ended...the free market has stepped in and is ready to satisfy client demand by expanding the internet namespace to accomodate all.\" Author Douglass Rushkoff (Media Virus, Cyberia) adds, \"What had been a fairly limited range of .coms and .edus now becomes as diverse as language itself, transforming a limited resource into an inexhaustible one.\" While Garrin certainly hopes to make a few bucks off his ingenuity, he also hopes that others around the world will create their own alternate nameservers, and has developed a system through which everyone -- even InterNIC -- can update one another on all their new names. To him this is much more than a business. It'"}, {"response": 3, "author": "terry", "date": "Sun, Dec 15, 1996 (12:29)", "body": "Sent from: Boris Groendahl mailto://boris@berlin.snafu.de Expanding the Internet Namespace The overcrowding of the \"com.\" domain on the internet has led to much speculation, name piracy, ransom and blackmail. From pirates who registered McDonalds.com to blackmailers who hijacked Tiger Woods and snatched up \"tigerwoods.com\" then attempted to ransom it back to Mr. Woods...by insisting on creating and hosting his website! The current Domain Name System is an arcane and obsolete legacy of the cold war, when the identity and purpose of a network was reflected in its name. Now that the internet has commercialized, the nature of the Domain Name System has reached its limits and can no longer sustain the demands of commercial and personal users. The arbitrary designation of \"com\" has created the problem of how a company can express its identity by their network address. IBM, Inc. becomes IBM.com....that's fine when there is only one \"Big Blue\", but what happens when companies in other states or countries (the net is international!) have similar names? If Widgets, Inc., Widgets, Ltd., Widgets Bros., or Widgets Corp. had to face this today, only one of them could prevail under the current system.... and whomever was first to register 'widgets.com\" would hold the prized net address. Now, thanks to Media Artist Paul Garrin, and an international network of artists and friendly hackers, all of the names can be had....widgets.inc, widgets.ltd, widgets.bros and widgets.corp are all possible under a new internet address naming scheme Garrin calls \"name.space\". His new company, Name.Space, Inc. has put in place a network of root nameserver computers in several countries throughout Europe, with it's home base in the USA. Name.Space is the new competition for the newly privatized and de-facto monopoly on Domain Name Service now held by Network Solutions, Inc. of Herndon, Va. Network Solutions, Inc. was granted the contract to run the InterNIC (Internet Network Information Center) which was formerly run by the National Science Foundation (NSF) who, as a US taxpayer supported entity, registered domain names for free on a first come, first served basis. Since NSI took over InterNIC, they began charging $100 per name for new registrations, which recently hit a high of 50,000 per month, richly lining the pockets of this de-facto monopoly that dominates the deregulated internet marketplace. Although privatization should have upgraded the InterNIC to a free-market business, it has instead continued the bureaucratic nature of its predecessors--and not surprisingly-- for NSI, although on the surface is a private comapny, their ties to inside the D.C. beltway are apparent. The parent company of NSI, Scientific Applications International Corp. (SAIC) is a $2billion employee-owned company of about 20,000 with offices located internationally. SAIC is the number one private consulting firm to the Pentagon, NSA and CIA, and were responsible for the strategy of c3i (Command, Control, Communications, Intelligence) in the Gulf War. In 1995, SAIC (spelled backwards reads \"CIAs\") billed and collected $975 million from the Pentagon alone. SAIC bought NSI in March, 1995--just weeks before the NSI announced the intention to charge for domain names, which until then was a free process, paid for by US tax dollars. Registering a name with NSI can be painful and delayed... and the request for new top level domains is a long, painful process with no guarantees. Enter the free market.... Companies such as Name.Space. are now offering new top level domains, or rootnames, on demand. Registrations take place over an automated web interface which upon completion, renders the newly registered names active immediately. Users have the option of having unpublished addresses (much like unpublished phone numbers), an option that InterNIC/NSI/SAIC does not allow. Garrin's new scheme all but puts the name \"prospectors\" out of business. He suggests dozens of new possible domain names, and even invites you to think of your own. As Paul Garrin stated, \"The InterNIC/NSI command economy of artificial shortages has ended...the free market has stepped in and is ready to satisfy client demand by expanding the internet namespace to accomodate all.\" Author Douglass Rushkoff (Media Virus, Cyberia) adds, \"What had been a fairly limited range of .coms and .edus now becomes as diverse as language itself, transforming a limited resource into an inexhaustible one.\" While Garrin certainly hopes to make a few bucks off his ingenuity, he also hopes that others around the world will create their own alternate nameservers, and has developed a system through which everyone -- even InterNIC -- can update one another on all their new names. To him this is much more than a business. It's an appropriation of an essentially public space by the public who truly deserve it. \"We're shifting the naming paradigm from militarism to democracy, and fulfilling the ideal nature of the Internet, which is"}, {"response": 4, "author": "terry", "date": "Sun, Feb  9, 1997 (20:50)", "body": "SEVEN NEW TOP LEVEL DOMAIN NAMES ARE ADDED FOR INTERNET ADDRESSES AND UP TO 28 NEW REGISTRARS PLANNED WASHINGTON, DC, February 4, 1997 -- The number of names available to specify Internet locations, such as web sites and email addresses, will increase and more firms will be allowed to act as registrars for the names, under a plan announced today by the International Ad Hoc Committee (IAHC). Internet users will have 7 new generic Top Level Domains (gTLDs), in addition to the existing ones (.com, .net, and .org), under which they may register Internet names, when the plan is implemented. The new gTLDs and the intended fields of use are: .firm for businesses, or firms .store for businesses offering goods to purchase .web for entities emphasizing activities related to the WWW .arts for entities emphasizing cultural and entertainment activities .rec for entities emphasizing recreation/entertainment activities .info for entities providing information services .nom for those wishing individual or personal nomenclature In addition, up to 28 new registrars will be established to grant registrations for second-level domain names under the new gTLDs. The new registrars will be selected by lottery from applicants who fulfill specific requirements established by the IAHC. All the new gTLDs will be shared among the new registrars, meaning that each registrar may effect registration of second-level domain names under all the new gTLDs. It is intended that the three existing gTLDs (.com, .net, and .org) would also be shared upon conclusion of the cooperative agreement between Network Solutions, Inc. (NSI) and the United States National Science Foundation (NSF), which allows NSI to act as the registrar for those gTLDs. The plan announced today is a result of efforts by an international group named to resolve questions critical to the current and future growth of the Internet. The eleven-member International Ad Hoc Committee, chaired by Donald M. Heath, president and CEO of the Internet Society, received input from individuals, organizations and government agencies from around the world. To guide future registrar developments, an association comprising all the registrars, the Council of Registrars (CORE), to be established under Swiss law will create and enforce requirements for registrar operations. These requirements are spelled out in a separate legal instrument to which each registrar must agree. The IAHC plan includes the establishment of a non- regulatory policy framework in the form of a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) which both the public and private sector will be invited to sign. The MoU will provide a mechanism for signatories to advise on future policy evolution of the global Internet domain name system. \"I am pleased that the Secretary General of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) has agreed in principle to act as the depository of the MoU and to periodically publish an updated list of its signatories,\" Heath said in releasing the IAHC report. \"The structure we have established for the operation and oversight of domain name administration insures that we will have stability and continuing input from a broad spectrum of organizations and individuals.\" Heath pointed out that the IAHC will continue to function for the period until the new registrars are named and the MoU has entered into force. At that time, the IAHC will change to act as the committee to conduct oversight of CORE until a permanent gTLD DNS Policy Oversight Committee (POC) is established to perform that function. The POC will determine, in consultation with CORE and a gTLD DNS Policy Advisory Body (PAB), the evolution of gTLDs, registrars, and any fees that CORE may collect from its members, the registrars, for services it may perform. The POC and CORE will be advised by the gTLD DNS Policy Advisory Body (PAB) that will consist of all of the signatories to the MoU and will provide input and recommendations for general policy matters relating to gTLDs and the Domain Name System (DNS). Signatories will include representatives from governments, independent governmental organizations, non-government organizations, and industry. An earlier draft proposal by the IAHC had recommended a mandatory 60 day waiting period before activation of new domain names, in order to alleviate what is considered to be a major source of instability in the DNS, namely widespread piracy of famous trademarks by certain domain name holders. In the final report, that recommendation has been replaced by a more comprehensive solution that addresses the needs of all classes of stakeholders. In addition to making the 60 day waiting period optional for registrants, the final report institutes a system for dispute settlement involving on-line mediation, mandatory arbitration (if a domain name challenger chooses to initiate arbitration), and a fast-track on-line administrative domain name challenge procedure. The administrative domain name challenge procedure would be "}, {"response": 5, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Wed, Jan 12, 2000 (15:37)", "body": "But these new domains didn't go live yet, did they? internet conference Main Menu"}]}, {"num": 8, "subject": "The future of the Internet", "response_count": 9, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "terry", "date": "Sun, Sep 22, 1996 (15:40)", "body": "Will java based network computers or NCs replace the memory and storage laden desktop computers? There's lots of hype about this and Microsoft wouldn't like to see their os become obsolete. Waht do you think?"}, {"response": 2, "author": "smckern", "date": "Tue, Nov 26, 1996 (20:34)", "body": "I heard a great deal a few years ago about holograms being the storage used on the internet... perhaps the desktop will go?"}, {"response": 3, "author": "tedchong", "date": "Mon, Dec  9, 1996 (23:23)", "body": "I think the future of Internet is just like handphone or pager some years ago. Internet will be the way of life, and every new pc in the future will have built-in web access. ."}, {"response": 4, "author": "terry", "date": "Mon, Dec  9, 1996 (23:56)", "body": "As will every tv, every toaster, every blender . . ."}, {"response": 5, "author": "COMTRON", "date": "Thu, Jan 30, 1997 (20:53)", "body": "UP TO THIS MOMENT THE INTERNET HAS FOUND A BIG EXPLOTION ON IT USE DUE TO THE NOVELTY OF IT USE BY THE GENERAL PUBLIC. THE REAL USEFULLNESS OF IT HAS NOT BEEN REALLY USED EXTENSIVELY.THERE IS A GREAT POTENTIAL IN THE AREA OF POLITICAL SERVICES, PARTICULARLY BECAUSE IT HAVE THE POTENTIAL TO EXPOSE THE CLEAR INTENTIONS OF PEOPLE IN THE PUBLIC SERVICE MAKING THEM OPEN FOR HONEST CRITISM AND LEAVING THEM VULNERABLE TO BE DENOUNCED AS FAKE WITH REAL INFORMATION OBTAINED IN AN OPEN FORUM.LET ME BE MORE SPECIFIC.IF SOMONE TRY TO ASSERT HIS INTEREST ON SOMETHING (PROJECT OR SERVICE) AND ANOTHER PERSON KNOWS THAT HIS OR HER REAL VESTED INTEREST ON THIS OR THAT IS DUE TO POSSIBLE DIRECT OR INDIRECT BENEFITS ON THE EVOLVEMENT OF THE SAME PROJECT, HE OR SHE CAN BE OPENLY BE EXPOSED AND CONSECUENTLY UNMASKED OF HIS OR HER REAL INTENTIONS. OBSTACLES EXIST LIKE THE QUALITY OF THE VIDEO, AUDIO AND INTERACTIVE COMUNICATIONS BUT LITTLE BY LITTLE EACH ONE OF THEM ARE BEING WORKED OUT POSITIVELY."}, {"response": 6, "author": "terry", "date": "Fri, Jan 31, 1997 (07:58)", "body": "Check out our politics conference if you get a chance, COMTRON. ALL CAPS is a bit hard to read though."}, {"response": 8, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Mon, May 24, 1999 (13:11)", "body": "SAN FRANCISCO, May 21 /PRNewswire/ via NewsEdge Corporation -- \"The golden age of unregulated Internet is just about over,\" said Rachelle Chong, former Commissioner of the Federal Communications Commission and now a telecom partner at the international law firm Coudert Brothers in California. \"Regulations governing the Internet are developing at differing speeds, in varying directions. Because the Internet does not operate within set geographic boundaries and borders, the emerging patchwork quilt of regulatory policies and laws may stifle its growth and potential as an engine for e-commerce,\" said Ms. Chong. \"Governments will not be able to help themselves from regulating the Internet,\" she added. Government regulation will come because rapid upgrades of communications and data infrastructure will force governments to adopt their traditional role of mediating disputes and developing regulatory guidelines for competing players. Also, the lure of revenue from e-commerce \"has the government sitting up and paying attention because government has a traditional role associated with regulating commerce and consumer protection.\" Many local, state and national governments want to tax e-commerce transactions that have some nexus to their jurisdictions. \"Recognizing that e-commerce can bring new revenues to government coffers from worldwide sources, some jurisdictions are thinking about burdening Net transactions with taxes.\" Content regulation is also inevitable, according to Ms. Chong. Content related issues include copyright violations, the impact of technology-based filtering software and which type of content to regulate. Ms. Chong made her remarks at the 1999 Pacific Telecommunications Council mid-year seminar in Manila. Founded in 1853, Coudert Brothers is one of the oldest and most respected international law firms, with 27 offices in most major business and governmental centers. Coudert Brothers has offices in New York, Washington, DC, San Francisco, Palo Alto, Los Angeles, San Jose, Denver, Montreal, London, Paris, Brussels, Frankfurt, Berlin, Hong Kong, Singapore, Beijing, Tokyo, Bangkok, Jakarta, Ho Chi Minh City, Hanoi, Sydney, Almaty, Moscow, and St. Petersburg. SOURCE Coudert Brothers CONTACT: Chris Tofalli of Broadgate Consultants, 212-232-2222, for Coudert Brothers Web site: http://www.broadgate.com/ [Copyright 1999, PR Newswire]"}, {"response": 9, "author": "KitchenManager", "date": "Wed, Jun  2, 1999 (08:44)", "body": "The Internet Law Page http://floridalawfirm.com/iplaw/index.html"}, {"response": 10, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Sun, Feb 13, 2000 (00:23)", "body": "Any real-life comments? Killer posts are informative, but there is nothing quite as interesting as personal comments. internet conference Main Menu"}]}, {"num": 9, "subject": "Is the net grinding to a halt?  netlag and worse", "response_count": 6, "posts": [{"response": 1, "author": "terry", "date": "Sun, Sep 22, 1996 (20:49)", "body": "Panix, a major service in NYC ground to a near halt recently and the following was posted on it's motd (message of the day): The attacker is forging random source addresses on his packets, so there is no way to find his/her location. There is also no way to screen out those packets with a simple router filter. This is probably the most deadly type of denial-of-service attack possible. There is no easy or quick way of dealing with it. If it continues into Saturday we will start working on kernel modifications to try to absorb the damage (since there's absolutely no way to avoid it). This however will not be an easy job and it could take days to get done (and get done right). For those who are IP hackers, the problem is that we're being flooded with SYNs from random IP addresses on our smtp ports. We are getting on average 150 packets per second (50 per host). We are not the only site being attacked in this way. I know of one other site that is being attacked in an identical manner right now, and I know of three others that have been attacked in the last two weeks. I hope that this means that the attacker is merely playing malicious games, and will soon tire of molesting our site. If that is the case, mail will come back up as soon as the attack ends. But if the attacker is really interested in damaging Panix specifically, the attack may *never* stop and service won't be restored until we can write kernel modifications. Scary stuff. We'll keep you posted. This happened a couple of weeks ago."}, {"response": 2, "author": "terry", "date": "Sun, Sep 22, 1996 (20:52)", "body": "Laura Lemay explained it like this, actually one of her boyfreinds explained it to her and she passed this along: \" You can't block forged packets at the router, he says, but you can hack with the TCP stack (in the kernel) so that the machine will absorb them better. He explained it to me like this: TCP stacks have basically a list of incoming TCP connections. When a connection is made, it gets a spot in the list. The TCP stack then handles each connection in parallel, either handling it or dropping it on the floor once it times out. By default, however, the timeout for incoming connections is 75 seconds. 99.999% of TCP connections are handled way faster than that. For most uses of TCP, that doesn't matter all that much because there are enough slots in the list to handle all the incoming connections. With the panix attack, because there are so many connections coming in at once, the slotsin the list fill up, and each one is only emptied once every 75 seconds. You can't get a legitimate connection in to be processed. THe solution, therefore, is to expand the list and to shorten the timeout. It won't stop the attack, but it'll make the machine better equipped to deal with it and ordinary reqeusts more likely to get through.\" - from Laura Lemay, well known author of books on java and html"}, {"response": 3, "author": "terry", "date": "Sun, Sep 22, 1996 (20:54)", "body": "And the bad news that the software that sens SYN bombs is widely available on the net. It's menu driven: A. Choose the site you want to SYN bomb\". This may become a major problem on the net in weeks to come."}, {"response": 4, "author": "terry", "date": "Tue, Mar  3, 1998 (05:33)", "body": "Here's the answer: I don't know if this fits the bill, but there used to be a ventured-backed startup called nFX out of the MIT Media Lab that did something that could be construed to be \"text-to-avatar\" stuff. They had a technology that allowed an animator to create a \"template\" for a cartoon character by feeding the system several line drawings of it in various positions and specifying areas of it as nose, eyes, etc. Once you did that, then it would automatically generate animations based on textual commands (literally stage directions: \"walk three steps to the left\"). Had wonderful potential for the web, as the textual commands were very low bandwidth and pretty comprehensive. It seems is still alive. And here's the question: -----Original Message----- From: Carol Curry [mailto:ccurry@poet.com] Sent: Monday, March 02, 1998 7:04 PM To: terry@www.spring.com Subject: text to avatar Terry, Do you know of a product and/or company that does text to avatar translation? We're building an NT-based content management demo and we want to include this feature. Thanks for any help you can provide. CKC Carol Kay Curry VP Marketing POET Software (650) 286-4640 ccurry@poet.com"}, {"response": 6, "author": "aschuth", "date": "Thu, Nov 18, 1999 (23:39)", "body": "At least my current provider is slower than my last, ISDN or no ISDN."}, {"response": 7, "author": "MarciaH", "date": "Fri, Nov 19, 1999 (00:17)", "body": "I am regularly logged on at 49.333 bps internet conference Main Menu"}]}]}